Our first stop of the tour was in Gouda and lasted an hour. I decided to visit St. Janskerk. The entrance fee is €3.50 and it was well worth the cost. The church, and especially the stand-glass windows, are simply spectacular. Afterwards, myself and two of my fellow travelers headed to the open-air market. At this point I broke off from my mini group as they needed to break for lunch, while I continued exploring the market. I got a glimpse of the City Hall and Weigh House while looking around, and even had a chance to pick up a special souvenir for my mother-in-law. I had a “simple” lunch of french fries with mayonnaise. I must say, I wish I would have tried this combination (popular in the Netherlands) when I was in Amsterdam, because it was quite good.
I was so excited to see that Henk had added Kinderdijk (a World Heritage site) into the final itinerary. Originally when I signed up for the cruise, it wasn’t included. I have wanted to see this site since I first read about it 10 years ago when I started working at Witte Travel. I must say all the images I’ve seen, and even the ones I finally got a chance to take, doesn’t do it justice. Many of us headed out see get as close as we could to the windmills…there are 19 in total. We only had a short time here, a mere 20 minutes, to take pictures and get a drink at the small café before we had to be on the road again to meet up with the Salvinia and begin our cruise.