Summer is Here!

I've had a fun few weeks here in Amsterdam... It's been week after week of holidays and long weekends, complemented by wonderful sunny weather. For the last 10 days it's been 75 and sunny... wow! Great!

Before Queen's Day there was a Ferris Wheel set up on the Nieuwe Markt... but this wasn't just any Ferris Wheel. It was (according to the sign) the world's smallest turning cafe. That's right, you get on, order food or drinks, and enjoy them as you spin around. What a great concept!!
Needless to say, Albert and I jumped on, and I think we stayed on for more than a half hour... good times. Unfortunately we didn't have a camera with us, so here we are in front of it the next day:

Also, I couldn't resist posting another picture from Keukenhof. What a beautiful place!

Then, yesterday was National Windmill Day AND National Cycling Day, so Albert and I went up north to Alkmaar, rented some bikes, and saw a bunch of windmills. The first one we stopped at is still a functioning mill, so we bought some wind-milled pancake mix and ate delicious homemade cake. Yum!
Here's Albert in front of part of the milling contraption:

And me, cycling through a field of flowers:

And, of course, some windmolen. These particular ones were not mills, but instead were used to pump water off the land into the higher dykes. This is how a good portion of the Netherlands was reclaimed from the water.

Then, finally, we finished up our windmill day back in Amsterdam, at Brouwerij 't IJ, our local windmill/brewery. This was exciting enough in itself because the place is always packed with people from the neighborhood - they have a great patio and tasty, cheap beer. However, things got even better when Johnny & the Gangsters of Love pulled in:

They look just like that, and they're a three-man band in '67 Pontiac Bonneville: "the fastest band in the world". I would highly recommend watching their trailer and/or movie on their website... it was just great! They pulled up, parked on the sidewalk, in a minute had their whole stage set up, jumped on the hood, and started to play! The perfect ending to such an exciting day.
(If you want to see more pictures from Windmolen Dag, click here: http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0BbNnLRwyYsnMw&notag=1)