Jan 12 - Netherlands' Polders

So today we went to visit polders which are drained lakes. There are three major ones in Noord-Holland. The area on the map is the area that we toured today, looking at polders and windmills.
This picture is just the vast flat land that used to be all underwater.












Just to let you know how deep these polders/ drained lakes are, here is a picture of a house that is one the bottom of the polder right next to the dike that surrounds the polder. Some of them are around 6-8 meters.









After we toured around a bit we stopped at a windmill museum. Normally the museum isn't open during the winter months but, our professors know the owner so we were able to go in and see a working windmill (it was really windy that day).






















These are some of the gears that turn the Archimedes screw to lift the water up. The way that they used to lift the water out was by a water wheel, but that could only lift the water about 1 meter. With the Archimedes screw the water can be lifted up to 3 meters. It was really windy that day so they were going really fast. But the miller said that they still weren't going fast enough.















This was the gear connected to the blades on the windmill. Just on the other side of the gears outside the building were the spinning blades.











The entire top of the windmill turns on these wooden cylinders. There is a huge wheel to turn the entire windmill top and our prof said that it takes almost all of the miller's weight and strength to turn it.









This is the windmill that we went up into. And Matt and I took the classic Dutch boy and girl picture in front of it. It is a tradition on this interim to take that picture with a couple on the trip and since we were the only couple, we did it.















After the windmill museum we went to a city that is almost entirely carbon neutral. All of the buildings have solar panels on the top of them. The next couple of pictures are just from around the city. The house that are surrounded by water are on pretty much their own island and of course the most expensive ones.



































That night we were able to meet up with the other Calvin interim that is touring the Netherlands. We went to a Chinese restaurant in Amsterdam. There are the pictures of the two tables that we had, total of 27 people. And then the professor table. The two gentlemen sitting behind the table are our professors on this interim and the one closest to the camera is Prof. De Vries who is my Dutch prof and leading the other interim.

















So I will try and post more posts in the next couple of days to catch up with the days. Tot ziens. (see you later)