Day Six in Amsterdam
Our day began on the train again, but we did have one hiccup on this trip. Both Lola and I were dozing off as we made the hour-long ride to Gouda. On the outskirts of the city, there was a stop with Gouda in the name, but not the main station. Lola heard it and woke me up and we bundled off the train in a hurry, half-asleep. As we exited, we were stuck by how rural the station looked. If were was a city here, we weren't seeing it. I checked my phone and realized we had gotten off one exit too soon. It was an easy fix as we just hopped on the next train through, which arrived about ten minutes later.
At Gouda, we exited the station and made our way down a quaint street to entered The Gouda Cheese Experience. The woman behind the counter seemed surprised to have visitors, but was pleasant and set us up for our trip through the display. I won't lie and say this wasn't touristy or maybe a little cheesy. BUT doing things like this allow you to get a feel for a city, a country, a cheese. It's part of buying in and going full bore. We had a great time going through the different displays, learning about Gouda cheese, filling in our questionnaire and becoming cheese masters at the end. We took cheesy pictures dressed up as cheese workers, because when in Gouda...
As we left, we talked with the workers a bit and it became very clear that cities outside of Amsterdam resent the draw and prestige of the big city. I completely get it, in the same way that I wish more people knew more about El Paso and less about Austin. What also came through from the people here was how happy they were to have visitors. We learned later that American tourism has really dropped off because of Covid and we were some of the first Americans to visit in a while.
After the Cheese Experience, we made our way into city center (dominated by a beautiful building that was built to weigh cheese in the 1600s). There was a modern restaurant called Gouds Glas and we sat down on the outside patio (which was heated, thankfully) and ordered some food. The nachos were surprisingly good, given the setting. The burgers, however, came with what appeared to be salsa on them. I took one bite and said "you're done." Lola ate a couple more bites and then joined me in leaving the burger on the table. We had a slight issue with our payment as they were having WIFI issues and couldn't use their card reader. Because of the delay we were late to our afternoon visit to the syrup waffle factory.
The Kamphuisen Siroopwaffle factory has been operating since the mid 1800s and are very proud of it. After giving us some stick for being late, we were ushered into a room with a talking mirror who walked us through the history of the syrup waffle. Once the presentation ended, we entered into the factory floor, where we were shown the entire process from mixing the dough to cooking to adding the syrup to the packaging. It was a fun experience. There was a slide to exit to the factory and you know Lola and I took the plunge. After we were served a cappuccino and some cake in a little cafe at the factory. The lady behind the counter talked about wanted to visit America someday. I never know what to say in those conversations, because I do everything I can to see the REST of the world.
When we got home on the train, we hurried home to toss our bags and then made our way back to the Red Light District before it got too late. We made it in time to get the experience one last day. After our tour through the strip, we took the Metro back to De Pijp and stopped at a smoke shop for a last day joint. We sat on our bench, watching a couple of rats run around the edge of the canal, and smoked for the final evening of this trip. We stopped at the grocery store on the corner to pick up some water and some fruit and then went back to the apartment for the evening. We crashed out early, around 630p, leaving the packing for tomorrow.
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