The Netherlands 2012 – Part 3

Part 2: Vienna

In this episode, I went to the windmill museum Zaanse Schans, my First Ever Real Castle, Muiderslot, and to the tiniest Dutch city, Madurodam.

This is a boardgame called Lionheart and it’s basically Warhammer Lite crossed with chess.

Our next trip was to the Zaanse Schans, a windmill museum on the Zaanse river, the heart of the wind-powered industrial area in days gone by. There are eight restored windmills here, and a number of village buildings

You may notice some graphical glitches; my camera was old even in 2012

I believe this windmill was for grinding nuts for oil.

It went extremely fast when the wind was up

This is part of the mechanism for turning the entire windmill (!!) to face the wind.

The next mill is a sawmill; it’s actually a reconstruction rather than a restoration

The other side of the sawmill

Sheep!

I think this was the place we were at a café for lunch in the village, and they were so busy they just brought our drinks and then never returned to take our actual food order. So we left enough change on the table to cover the drinks and then departed (we were hungry!), then bought sandwiches at a stall in the train station; fresh-made sandwiches with tomato, cheese, and cucumber on a lovely bun (which combination even today forms the basis of my lunches).

The lack of in-between pictures makes it look like we were always doing tourist things, but I am certain we had many days off in between everything. I was there for an entire month, after all! It was pretty hot out, so there was a lot of time we just spent chilling in the garden, for instance.

A much closer tourist destination is the castle of Muiderslot. It’s just a short bike ride away, but I can’t ride a bike, so we took the bus.

Swans in the canal under the highway in Diemen

According to my notes, the back tower is leaning over quite far; the conservators have put concrete into the moat to prevent it from falling any further.

The entrance to the garden

I think the flag on the right is of the Count of Holland.

At the falconry field. This owl is named Ollie and he is incredibly lazy, apparently. He wouldn’t bother to run away even if he was loose, because he is too lazy to hunt for himself.

Siberian owl. Less lazy, but sleepy at this time of day. Also they keep them tied up not so that they don’t run away (not that Ollie would, apparently) but so that they don’t kill each other.

The castle from the falconry field

A 19-year old retired falcon

Falconer-in-training, with a mini-owl

The lazy owl

Apparently he can count. So you can stroke him on the belly twice, but if you do it three times, he’ll get huffy.

The mini-owl is an adult

The mini-owl does allow pets

Looks just like a sleepy cat

Can’t tell if the little owl is sleepy or hunched against the wind

The winch for the gate, not currently hooked up to anything

The little hut is running out of thatch because every time the American Buzzard lands on it, she takes a clawful away with her. : P

The well is in the centre of the courtyard, and covered

We went on an extensive tour of the inside, but this is the only picture you get from it.

As part of the falconry show, they let the American Buzzard loose, and she flew straight to here. Then they had her fly around the courtyard, but she was temperamental and wouldn’t always fly to the bait.

I did eventually learn to ride a bicycle while I was there. Tharash’s mom let me use her step-through bike, and for several days (maybe even a whole week?) I practised on the brick-paved residential street outside their house. Tharash would run with me and push me, and we’d make a loop of the streets. Apparently the neighbours still remember this spectacle. XD I’d be embarrassed if I knew or met any of them… I don’t know what day I finally succeeded, but I’ll put the evidence here.

Another thing that must have happened at some point was that we went on a 4-hour sail on a sailing ship, Tharash thinks it was in Lelystad (man, I don’t remember going so far from Amsterdam). I vaguely remember there was a nautical museum nearby where there was a beautiful replica ship, and a drydock where they were restoring a tallship from the hull up.

One day we went to Den Haag to see one of my favourite things: miniature things!! There’s a park called Madurodam which has miniature replicas of the Netherlands’ most famous sights. So it was kind of like speed-running tourism of the whole country.

Pretty clouds on the train to The Hague

A giant heron! Ngl, all the wildlife running around the park made me lol

Cheese market!!

I love the level of detail, and also the use of real plants/bonsai

I wonder where this ruin is irl

For some reason I don’t have any pictures of the full tower, but that thing with the arch is the tower of the Dom of Utrecht, which was disconnected from its church during a tornado (!!) many centuries ago. You can see the floor plan of the Dom in the square. They didn’t put the rest of the Dom in; they put a path for the public instead.

Carillon tower which I saw in Amsterdam

Not enough bicycles

The ship at the Maritime Museum

Fish! Photo by MH

The back alley behind the Royal Theatre, complete with people unloading costumes and scenery

The front of the Royal Theatre – I bet those posters were on the real building, too

Dam Square in Amsterdam! The Nieuwe Kerk on the right and the Royal Palace on the left.

We walked past this a lot irl

Rijksmuseum!! Part of what i loved about this model was that they had large skylights, through which you could see parts of exhibitions! There was a room on Delftware just like we saw in the real one, and of course there was the Night Watch.

Irl, we only walked through about an eighth of this massive building

This was where the entrance was when we went in

The Nieuwe Kerk from the other side

A city gate with no city

I like the formal garden of this palace

Spiderman has been here. Photo by MH

Maritime Museum ship, from the other side

Tharash: so what if you’re all the way at the other end of this garden and you suddenly need to use the bathroom?

Oh hei this looks familiar

Um, the gate is missing

Having visited the real thing just the other day, I was very impressed

They even have less monumental things, like polders

The high-speed train to ‘Paris’

This bridge really goes up and down

Photo by MH

Lots of interactive things for kids; those two fireboats can be controlled from the shore, and the point is to put out the fire on the boat. You can also spray the other fireboat instead, if you like. : )

The Deltaworks

Photo by MH

They close the Deltaworks periodically to show you how it works

Photo by MH

Even this pedestrian bridge is a small version of a bigger bridge elsewhere, iirc

Photo by MH

The train station included a bus going to Wageningen! Which is where Tharash’s university at this time is

These reflections are really funny to me XD Photo by MH

Photo by MH

Huis ten Bosch, with lots of bonsai

I think this was the ING headquarters? It’s pretty whimsical for being made of brick

A bit of Schiphol airport

Flowers made of beads, which glittered in the sun. This area felt less finished. Somewhere around here they had a kids’ interactive minigame to show how flower auctions work. Or used to work; I’m told they aren’t really a thing anymore.