as the Dutch do

Ate lunch at an Argentine restaurant (the Dutch must really appreciate Argentina's touch with the beef because there are a surprising number of Argentine steakhouses around). Trying to avoid getting hit by cyclists, I walked over to the meeting spot for Mike's Bike Tour, and met Pete, my overly tanned guide from Ottawa. Oddly enough--or maybe not--all on the tour were American: from Philadelphia, Chicago, Memphis, and Connecticut. Cycled around the city for a while and then out to a cheese and wooden shoe factory (fully operating, but a tourist trap which I'm sure generates a fortune by shuffling through Mike's Bicyclists). I couldn't bring to buy something in principle since it was a set-up -- reminiscent of our set-up in Ephesus, which I also had no intention of falling for -- even though the cheese I sampled was very good. We returned by way of an old windmill and Vondelpark, Amsterdam's "Central Park" that was established at the same time as our Central Park. A good way to spend the day. Ate dinner near Sara's place off of Kalverstraat, a main shopping street.