Windmills in Kinderdijk, Holland

The week was full of rain. It has rained most days. I don't know how the farmers are going to harvest their fields. We have had weeks of rain and today it is windy too. All the fields are full of water standing in puddles. On Wednesday evening we invited Cedric Vanrykel, a former colleague of  Dave and Dad here with AMI, to dinner. He brought Laurene and I each a beautiful bouquet and we had an enjoyable evening of reminiscing and conversation.

Then on Friday Dad finally got the entire crew together at one time for a picture in his office area. Steven Dick, the one who invited Dad and Dave to come to work this summer is in the striped shirt on the left side of the back row.

Laurene had a birthday on Saturday so she chose to go to Kinderdijk. She wanted to see the windmills. It was a two hour drive to get to this small town in the Netherlands. The weather was great with no rain. Dave drove and the trip was uneventful. We pulled right into the windmills. It was amazing to see and understand what the windmills were for. I guess I thought they were for power or I guess I never realized what they did. They pumped the water out of the swamps so people could live there and were built in 1738. The peat moss that the swamp was made of was like a sponge holding the water. When they pumped the water out the land dropped to below sea level. We first got to see the great diesel-powered augers that pump the water to a river to take it away from the town.

Diesel-powered open auger pumps

There are canals that run water to the pumps to pump up to the rivers. They don't use the windmills all the time for this purpose now. They keep them in running order just in case the don't have electricity or diesel to run the pumps.

Windmills pump lowest water in center two channels up to two outside channels backed up by diesel-powered auger pumps into the Lek River at bottom of display. Water is raised four to five feet.

At the visitor center they had a neat movie that we watched. You sat on a stool so you could turn all the way around. It was comprised of six screens that were three hundred sixty degrees around you. People were talking in conversation on different screens. I think I wore out my pants bottom turning to watch the movie screens.

By this time we needed a spot of lunch. We sat at a restaurant table outside to have a sandwich. Outside the restaurant I tried on some wooden shoes.

Our next object was to see a windmill from the inside. They had a museum in one of the windmills. We hiked up a path that had canals on either side.

We crossed a bridge to see one up close. The arms of the mills were huge and spinning around at great speed. Inside you could see the huge wooden gears that turned with the wind to run the pump.

The millers also lived in the mills. There was a picture of the family that had lived in the muesem windmill that had six kids. With all the mechanics of the place there was little room to live. I still wonder where they all slept. I only saw two small beds tucked in a corner of the octagon. There was a table with two chairs and the kitchen was very small.

Then up a couple flights of stairs there was another small bed tucked in a corner by the stairs.

On the second level you can see the shaft that rotates to transfer the power from the blades above to the pump below

I think that they had nineteen of these wind mills in service. One didn't work but the rest were spinning around.

From Kinderkijk we drove to Zoetermeer near the city called The Hague to visit the LDS temple grounds.

On our way home we decided we wanted to stop to have dinner for Laurene's birthday. We stopped a couple on bicycles to ask where to find a place and the man picked a restaurant on the GPS in the city of Breda in the Netherlands. It was a real nice Chinese buffet with cloth napkins and flare. We were at table 273 so you can see it was big. The food was good with lots to eat.

They brought Laurene a desert of fruit with whipped cream and a fire works flare ablazing.

Also they gave her a box of fancy chopsticks. It was a fun night. Sunday we made our way as always to the city of Gent to go to Church. We will share a few pictures of the church and branch members we have met here.

Sign on billboard out on the street with church name in third row from top

The chapel and meeting rooms are on the second floor of this building

Here are many Belgian members we have grown to love