Hi, everyone!
It’s hard to keep track of where I am on this cruise! The Amadolce often sails at night, so I go to bed in one town and get up in another. Sometimes, when Grandma and Grandpa and I take a bus trip away from the ship, we come back to a different port from the one we left! Grandma helps me by reading me the ship’s schedule every day.
On Tuesday, we started in Amsterdam. Before the Amadolce left port, we took a canal cruise on a boat that could go under all the bridges in town. We went past the opera house and past a place where two canals meet and you can see all the bridges over the canal lined up in a row. It was very pretty! Then we got off that boat and went walking in parts of Amsterdam. The streets were much quieter than they were on King’s Day! We went to a very peaceful, hidden neighborhood called the Begijnhof. It’s sort of like a convent for women who did good works without actually being members of a religious order. The art museum is nearby, so we went to look at the entrance hallway. The carpet is art, too, telling stories about Amsterdam! By the time we finished walking and went back to the ship, I was a tired little lion!
While we were having lunch, the Amadolce sailed to Volendam. Before the Dutch closed off the sea, Volendam was a salt water fishing port. Now the water in the port is part of a lake, instead, and the fisherman catch eels instead of herring. I made friends with a grandpa fisherman statue and went walking in a neighborhood with little canals and bridges. Then we all got on a bus to ride to another town, Edam.
In Volendam, people catch fish. In Edam, they make cheese. Both towns have pretty canals and drawbridges, and the canals even have little locks in them! The famous cheese of Edam is round, like a ball. It is coated in red, black or orange wax to keep it from spoiling.
We took another bus ride along the dike that closed off the sea to visit a cheesemaker in Katwoude polder. I made friends with Josephine-san, the cheesemaker. She told us how she and her family make cheese and how the cheese gets different flavors. I got to try a basil pesto cheese. It is bright green, like pesto, but it was yummy! Outside there were big tanks to hold the milk they use to make cheese and the liquid (whey) left over after the cheese curds form. Then we went back to the Amadolce. I was happy to see my friend Reka-san! She plans all the trips we take on this cruise.
On Wednesday, the Amadolce was in Arnhem. Grandma and Grandpa and I took a bus trip to Apeldoorn, to see Het Loo palace. This is a hunting lodge built by the royal family, but now it belongs to the government and is open as a park. The first part we visited were the stables. There are only two horses living there now, but there were stalls for many more! Some of the stalls have been converted to displays of royal carriages and saddles and automobiles. After the stables, we went to the main palace. It reminds me of Versailles, but the style of the building is different. Grandma says the buildings look like colonial Williamsburg in Virginia because the same king and queen were involved in both places. The King’s garden has boxwood planted in big spirals. Last year a lot of the boxwood plants got sick, so new ones are being planted. It’s a big job! It was a big job for a little lion to climb the stairs to the palace, too! The rooms are very fancy, with lots of paintings and other wall decorations. The queen decorated the room where she made jam with seashells! Some rooms have carpets that have the same design as the ceiling. One room had animal rugs, but they didn’t look very friendly!
The nicest part of Het Loo are the main gardens behind the palace. They are laid out like the ones at Versailles, but the garden style is English, not French. The sun came out, and Grandma and Grandpa and I had a nice walk, enjoying the plantings and the fountains. At the end of the garden, there is a colonnade with tables where we ate lunch. Then I climbed up on top of the colonnade to get a view of the entire garden. Even though one whole section is being restored right now, it is a very pretty place! When we got back from our trip to Het Loo, the Amadolce was in a different town, Nijmegen. I needed a nap, so we went right back to the Amadolce. Look at my new towel friend who was waiting for us in our room!
On Thursday morning when I woke up, we were in Antwerp, Belgium. The Captain told us all the rivers, canals and lakes we have to take to make this journey, and it’s a very long list! In Antwerp, we were docked close enough to the old town center to have a walking tour from the boat. We climbed up the steps by the butchers’ guild hall. Guilds were organizations of people in the same occupation, like bakers, butchers, weavers and grain merchants. Most of the guild halls are on the market square with town hall, but the butchers are closer to the river because cutting meat is smelly, messy business! May 1 is a holiday, like Labor Day, in the Netherlands and Belgium. Most public buildings are closed and there was a carnival going on in the main square. The shops selling the local treat — cookies and chocolates in the shape of hands — were open. We walked around the outside of the cathedral and saw the statue honoring the early builders. Then I made friends with a Godzilla at the carnival jump house. We walked back to Amadolce for lunch.
Thursday afternoon, we took another bus trip to visit Brussels. On our way there, it started raining. There was a traffic jam near the royal greenhouses, because the Labor Day holiday is the one time in the year that the public can visit them. It was raining hard — much harder than either lion statues or little lions are happy with! By the time we got to the Congress Column, the rain had stopped. I made friends with one of the lions guarding the column, and I was a good helper to our guide Matthias. I helped hold the “green lollipop” sign that all the visitors from the Amadolce can see to help keep together. At the Congress Column, there is a memorial to an unknown soldier, meant to honor all the Belgian soldiers who died defending their country.
After the Congress Column visit, we spent time walking around the main square in Brussels. Just like Antwerp, that’s where the town hall and guild houses are. There was no carnival, but there were lots of people in the square because of the holiday. Many people were crowding down one little street to see the statue of a little boy peeing into a fountain (Manneken Pis). It’s a very famous statue, and every day the little boy is dressed in a different costume. Belgium is famous for making yummy chocolate and sweets, and those stores were open. I got to choose some fancy cookies from one store. Belgians also say that French fried potatoes aren’t French, they actually are Belgian. Belgian frites are served with mayonnaise. On the bus ride to Antwerp, we stopped at the site of a world exposition in 1956. The Belgian pavilion was called the Atomium, and it is the other symbol (with Manneken Pis) of Brussels. I was excited to see it, because that’s on the jigsaw puzzle of famous places that Grandma and I do together.
Love,
Lion-san
What a fun time you all have had! Nancy-san really liked the art rugs and she said she knew about guilds. Your paws must be worn down to the quick by now. We had a bouncy house on our street last Sat too. You are right, those animal rugs looked pretty scary! It is nice you get to visit some cookie and candy shops too.