Gouda ya do

Today we made our first (of many I'm sure) excursions out of our new home city. The Skoda zipped us down the A2 past Utrecht to the unbustling cheesetropolis of Gouda. For those of you thinking 'Gooooooodah', please replace the 'G' with a guttural noise from the back of your throat and the 'oo' with an 'ow'. Now you are speaking Dutch (the post-title only makes sense if pronounced in Nederlands).

After parking (I'll reserve an entire post for this phenomenon) near the canal, we ventured into the town market. Not surprisingly, there were several vendors offering an assortment of giant cheese wheels. The prices were pretty good, so we did purchase some Oude Kaas--yum. We strolled about the town for a bit, enjoying the unseasonable warmth. Clearly we packed a bit of Arizona in our bags (or 'most of Arizona in our bags' you may think as you look at our departure photos). We took our lunch at a cafe inside a bakery, happily nabbing a stroopwaffel sample to placate Liliane's cookie penchant on the way out.

Gouda was a very pleasant city, with interesting architecture throughout. A nice place to go to get the small town feel of the Netherlands. We didn't get to tour the Sint Janskerk, though it may be worth a visit if we pass through again. You can view some more pictures here.