The body clock can not be fooled all the time so I did not sleep well. 
 We left early for our 5 hour tour of the north country . Double decker bus, nearly every seat full. The skies clear and we are hot. I dressed for spring! It is nearly 20 degrees above normal. I would not like it here so much in the heat. Everyone just throws open windows....NO screens!!! We know that there are mosquitoes because they have been buzzing us every night. Of course it heats up in here and we open the screenless windows and they fly in. There is very little air conditioning in the country. The small restaurants just open the doors and bring tables out on the side walk. They also cross the narrow road and set up tables on the other side of the street. The wait staff just crosses back and forth. Different!
the country side is so different since most of the entire country is reclaimed from the water. they briefly explained how, and how long it takes...amazing. The small Dutch country was a world power since they had harnessed the wind long before others. It made them great ship builders. Technology changed that for them. 
We went to Zaanse Schans to see working windmills . There are only 1000 of 30000 windmills remaining. There is a large effort to save them. We visited the last remaining commercial sawmill in the world under the power of a windmill. We had a Dutch waffle in a little shop there. It had sugar and syrup... So good!
On to the cheese factory in Volendam. It was not much of a tour, but a brief explanation and a shopping opportunity. We had lunch in this town. The guide took us to a fresh fish place in this small touristy town. We did not have much time at any stop to see other things. This town is on the largest lake in Amsterdam. It was made by building a dyke to stop the flooding from the North Sea. We had fish from the lake, if you fry it I will try it....well I have my limits. They were bringing in eels at the dock. 
We took a boat over to Marken. I asked who was rowing. This big boat was not even making a breeze it was moving so slowly. At Marken we walked to the wooden shoe makers. They did a quick demonstration. There is still a large demand for thes shoes. The ground is very wet so they have to have water resistant footwear . Rubber boots do not protect against the cold. We were supposed to shop, but we did not have time. 
Back to Amsterdam. I had wanted to see the public library, but we have been walking so much we just could not fit in one more walk. We still have a hard few days ahead off us. 
 Back at the houseboat we are still trying to do some laundry with a combo washer dryer. This would require a lot of getting used to. The directions for this are in Dutch. There are no pictures. (As are the directions for the thermostat).
Some of the clothes have wrinkles on the wrinkles! I could not even iron out the wrinkles. It took us the rest of the day to do a few items!
we did not have any food so we went to find a real Dutch meal. I had written down some places to try. The Dutch do not have many national dishes, they are very international. We walked a while to find stamppot. It is potatoes mashed with a vegetable. Tonight's was with kraut or endive so we had one of each. One came with a large meat ball, the other with sausage. There is gravy in the middle! It was very tasty. The kraut and sausage was the best. Susan had fried chicken liver with bacon and onions. These small places cook very near so the smell was wonderful and of the course the doors were opened. It was warm in there too!
Susan wrote what she wanted to add. I edited slightly.  "Nothing is better than this. It is the most wonderful adventure I ever had in my entire life. I never had so much fun. More than anyone has done before . I am so blessed to see this country".
Of course she says this about all our trips at the time. Our next 12 days through the Baltic are not what she had in mind!
Some observations:
i got to two flea market, they really are for the fleas!
the people do not initiate conversations!
there are lots of smokers therefore lots of butts all over the ground.
H ouses are leaning as they settle with water underneath. 
Walking around is difficult. There in not much on level ground. The streets, sidewalk and some roads are bricked. The curbs have multilevels. Cars, bicycles, tricks, what ever moves can just ride up on the narrow sidewalks whenever they see the need. It takes three people to see all the directions that vehicles are coming at you. Four days of that is tiring. 
Tomorrow we embark on a 12 day cruise of the Baltic area. We have 8 port days and we have booked tours in all of them. A lot more walking is ahead. We probably will not add to the this blog in any significant  way. The wifi on ships is very slow and crowded. It is also very expensive. We will be so busy that I doubt I will feel like getting anything out. I make send one out at the end of the trip that covers some of this time. It remains to be seen. 
Until another time.