Christmas spirit at Chemship
Traditional the crew of Chemship team up together before Christmas to enjoy each other’s company. This year we choose the old Roman town of Maastricht to have our Christmas celebration.
Maastricht situated in the deep south of Netherlands is a multicultural beautiful city with influences from neighbouring countries, some people say it is a non-dutch town. The romans had their armies already at this strategic place next to the river Maas and Jeker but later Maastricht was the home to many foreign garrisons and therefor was influenced by various cultures.
Our day in Maastricht started with the most popular food in the province of Limburg and that is coffee with a traditional “vlaai”, the “vlaai” is made of dough and a filling of fruit such as cherry, apricot, strawberry or plum.
After our lunch we teamed up with two local guides who took us on a beautiful but cold tour around old part of the city. We learned about the old city walls and how Maastricht became a centre for trade and manufacturing principally of wool and leather industry in the middle aged. We visited some of the old watermills which gave Maastricht prosperity and later turned in steam powered engines which took Maastricht into the Industrial Revolution. The production of ceramics was one of the most important industries and shaped the new city over many years. It was a great tour but due to the below zero temperatures we were glad that we ended up in a nice warm brewery and again we learned lots about the beer history of Maastricht. How it became well known but due to a takeover totally disappeared. Some years ago, a few beer enthusiasts started in the cellars of the old brewery a microbrewery called the “Stads Brouwerij Maastricht”. After the tour through the brewery, we were rewarded with some very nice glasses of their best beers which set the tone for the rest of the day.
