Our second day in Amsterdam was a huge success! After our delicious breakfast at the hotel, we were off to our canal cruise which took us through a series of canals in Amsterdam. I found that looking at various buildings, landmarks, and bridges from the water rather than land provided a whole new perspective! I love all the architecture and how every building looks so different. One fact we learned about on our tour was how in the Netherlands, people pay taxes on the width of their building, not the length or height. For this reason, many apartments have very unique shapes. One apartment we passed on our tour was only 2 meters wide! We also learned that houses in Amsterdam didn’t have numbers until the 1800s, and instead used gable stones with unique identifiers. Some places still have these stones, and we even saw a few on our tour!

After the tour and a quick lunch break, we walked to our first site visit of the trip at Cacao and Spice. Salomé Trip-Wagenhuis, one of the owners, taught us everything there is to know about making sustainable chocolate, and let us try several samples! As a company, Cacao and Spice only work in direct trade and single origin. This ensures transparency among their products as they know exactly where their cacao beans come from. We learned that it is quite difficult to make sustainable chocolate since it takes 3 to 4 cacao pods to make one single chocolate bar. This means that businesses must be especially creative with how to reduce all their waste. She told us about how one company created cacao drinks from the juice created when cacao fermentation occurs. These juices have a fruity and refreshing taste and were even available to buy in their store! I was especially intrigued when Salomé told us that by using the juices from the cacao, businesses can make up to 30-40% more income and reduce waste. My favorite part of the day was sampling all of the chocolates available for sale in Cacao and Spice. We tried several different flavors including dark, milk, and white chocolate. All of these had very distinct tastes, but my favorite was the first dark chocolate we tried, which was 75% cacao from Peru.

The last part of our excursion was a history and innovation tour given by Salomé’s husband, Ian. He walked us around the streets of Amsterdam and gave us insight as to how the city has changed over the years. Many of the more run-down roads have been completely transformed into bustling streets filled with shops and stores. Ian explained how businesses and the local’s tolerance of other cultures and people was what contributed to the city’s success. I enjoyed getting to know more about Amsterdam from a local who knows all the best shops and restaurants, and this tour taught me a lot about the history of Amsterdam. We decided to continue our exploring after our excursions were complete for the day and continued browsing all of the local shops. All of the girls on the trip chose to get dinner together, and we ended up at a local Italian restaurant with a wide variety of choices. Despite our busy day, I am left with a sense of excitement and admiration for Amsterdam’s history, culture, and commitment to sustainability. I am looking forward to seeing the tulips in bloom tomorrow on our trip to De Tulperij!