10 - 16 October 2013
Day 9: Arrival
So I'm back in Amsterdam and I think this is my 9th day although I didn't actually stay in Amsterdam last time so that might not be accurate. Although I've already been here before, my friend hadn't and this time will be a different experience for me because I'm with a friend, I'm staying at a hostel and I'm not a wet-behind-the-ears, introverted, newbie backpacker. The train over was quite good and I slept the whole night. It was the same set up as the one I caught from Berlin to Karkow and I slept as well as I did on that one.
The first mission was to find a hostel and we hadn't booked anything so we wandered around looking at places as asking if there were spaces. We ended up at Shelter City Christian Hostel because it had beds free, it was cheap and it came with a good free breakfast. I'm not what you'd call a religious person, so this might seem like a weird choice, but it wasn't all in your face so I was fine. The funny part is that this hostel is on an alley way in the red light district and right next to a Thai massage parlour that we can assume does happy endings.
Walking tour
Next item on the to-do list is the free walking tour by Sandemans. We stopped off at a fast food place that has a wall of little boxes, each with hot food in it and you put your money in, the door opens and you *nom, nom, nom*. Literally the best idea EVER! Next stop was to get an umbrella because it was raining (apparently not unusual for Holland). The walking tour was great; the guide seemed to know his stuff (or was just a good storyteller), we noted a bunch of places we wanted to come back to see and my favourite part was when ended up at a restaurant that served stamppot, which is kind of like Dutch bangers and mash, and it was amazing!
Day 10: All sorts
An Israeli girl joined us today to go see what Amsterdam had to offer. The first stop was to get some space cake and although it was expensive (7 euro) it was really good cake (in both respects). Next stop was the Heineken Experience, which I'd already done but I was going with the crowd today plus you get to drink beers as part of it so it's not a hard sell. As part of your Heineken ticket you also get a free boat ride so we took that and got the free bottle opener from the Heineken gift shop. For lunch we went to a place called Wok to Walk, which does some good dishes (had quite a few last time). The space cake wasn't really working so we stopped to get some more but this stuff was cheaper (complaints come later). We spent some time in a drum and bass cafe watching the world go by before going back to the hostel to play Jenga and Uno.
Our Israeli friend was catching an overnight bus so we kindly walked her to the bus stop and it was right about then that the space cake really kicked in. It was only a 5 (sober) minute walk home but it took us A LOT longer than that and not just because my friend stopped for food that she didn't even want. The first space cake we had was great and had us at the laughing for no reason stage but the second lot was crap and just made me paranoid so we spent the evening in the hostel freaking out, thinking that everyone was looking at us, which they probably were. The lesson, get the good stuff!
Day 11: Windmills
Today was one of those annoying days where we had to move rooms, which means packing all your stuff and checking out just to undo it again that night, arrg! After that we caught the train to Zaanse Schans, which is a windmill village. We walked around and went into some of the widmills, tried the cheese in their gift shop (and bought some), took some photos in clogs of various sizes and had a look through the not-very-good museum.
After getting the train back to Amsterdam, we stopped in at the Sex Museum because, hey, that's what you do in Amsterdam. Then it was lunch time, Wok to Walk again and then onto a pub for a few beers. The walk home from the pub took us past a waffle place, where we stopped for a waffle with ice-cream and nutella, and because our hostel is in the red light district, we stopped in at a 2 euro peep show so we could say we did it.
Day 12: Anne Frank Huis.... actually no, cheese tasting
It was raining like mad today so when we got to the Anne Frank Huis and saw the massive line we instantly knew that wasn't happening. Instead we went over to a cheese shop that was pointed out to us on the walking tour and luckily, arrived just in time for the cheese tasting session where they let us (in exchange for money) taste 9 different cheeses and some complimenting wines. I really enjoyed most of them, so much so that I bought some afterwards. I also learnt that I can tell you if I like the taste of something, but that's about it. I can't pick if it tastes like chocolate or wood chips or any of the other tastes on the flavour card they gave us.
On the way home from the cheese shop we took refuge from the rain in a cafe and had to try to banana cake and stroopwafels because they smelt so good. We eventually made it back to the hostel but we were saturated so we hung around a bit to get changed and warm up.
In the evening we went for a walk to see a bridge that was decorated with lights and it looked pretty good. To make the walk worth it, we stopped at a local bar and listened to a guitarist play some of his own material. He has some skills and although all the songs he played had negative/depressing themes, he was almost comically sad.
Day 13: Anne Frank Huis, take 2
We tried again today and although the line was still huge, at least it wasn't blowing a gale and raining. The line took about an hour and I have to say, the place was kind of a let down. I'm not really sure what I expected but all the information they give you is pretty boring and I think it's because it's more about the house than the era in time or Anne's story. I can't recommend it.
Lunch was stamppot again, I just couldn't get enough and we also tried a Duvel beer. I'm going to have to start cooking this at home. Later in the afternoon we stopped at a bakery and they do the order food, sit down and eat it, then pay on the way out thing. The problem was we were there for about 2 hours and we forgot to pay when we left although we didn't realise until later that night.
My friend was leaving for England today, on the MegaBus (cool name eh?) so I walked her to the bus stop and that was the highlight of the evening.
Day 14: Family meet-up
Today I was catching up with family that live in Holland and I thought I should bring something so I chose stroopwafels and speculaas biscuits. They're both Dutch foods, which is probably strange of me to bring them along because they all know what they are but in my defence, they're good! On the way back from getting supplies, I stopped by the bakery we forgot to pay at yesterday and paid them. The girl behind the counter gave me the weirdest look, I guess because she wasn't sure why I even came back, but at least I had a clear conscience.
When it came time to head over to the family meeting, I thought I'd give myself lots of time in case something went wrong and I'm lucky I did because I screwed up catching the tram. <Insert excuses about multiple lines sharing the same section of track and not knowing what side of the road they stop on>. The end result was I made it on time so crisis averted. My aunty cooked some amazing Thai food and it was a really fun night with the family.
Day 15: SFA
Not much happened today. I did some blogging and got psyched up for the overnight bus trip to London. I'm not one for sleeping on buses, planes, etc but this MegaBus is far cheaper than the trains and it takes you from Amsterdam to Calias, onto the ferry and right into London so you can't do much better than that.
Day 9: Arrival
So I'm back in Amsterdam and I think this is my 9th day although I didn't actually stay in Amsterdam last time so that might not be accurate. Although I've already been here before, my friend hadn't and this time will be a different experience for me because I'm with a friend, I'm staying at a hostel and I'm not a wet-behind-the-ears, introverted, newbie backpacker. The train over was quite good and I slept the whole night. It was the same set up as the one I caught from Berlin to Karkow and I slept as well as I did on that one.
The first mission was to find a hostel and we hadn't booked anything so we wandered around looking at places as asking if there were spaces. We ended up at Shelter City Christian Hostel because it had beds free, it was cheap and it came with a good free breakfast. I'm not what you'd call a religious person, so this might seem like a weird choice, but it wasn't all in your face so I was fine. The funny part is that this hostel is on an alley way in the red light district and right next to a Thai massage parlour that we can assume does happy endings.
Walking tour
Next item on the to-do list is the free walking tour by Sandemans. We stopped off at a fast food place that has a wall of little boxes, each with hot food in it and you put your money in, the door opens and you *nom, nom, nom*. Literally the best idea EVER! Next stop was to get an umbrella because it was raining (apparently not unusual for Holland). The walking tour was great; the guide seemed to know his stuff (or was just a good storyteller), we noted a bunch of places we wanted to come back to see and my favourite part was when ended up at a restaurant that served stamppot, which is kind of like Dutch bangers and mash, and it was amazing!
Day 10: All sorts
An Israeli girl joined us today to go see what Amsterdam had to offer. The first stop was to get some space cake and although it was expensive (7 euro) it was really good cake (in both respects). Next stop was the Heineken Experience, which I'd already done but I was going with the crowd today plus you get to drink beers as part of it so it's not a hard sell. As part of your Heineken ticket you also get a free boat ride so we took that and got the free bottle opener from the Heineken gift shop. For lunch we went to a place called Wok to Walk, which does some good dishes (had quite a few last time). The space cake wasn't really working so we stopped to get some more but this stuff was cheaper (complaints come later). We spent some time in a drum and bass cafe watching the world go by before going back to the hostel to play Jenga and Uno.
Our Israeli friend was catching an overnight bus so we kindly walked her to the bus stop and it was right about then that the space cake really kicked in. It was only a 5 (sober) minute walk home but it took us A LOT longer than that and not just because my friend stopped for food that she didn't even want. The first space cake we had was great and had us at the laughing for no reason stage but the second lot was crap and just made me paranoid so we spent the evening in the hostel freaking out, thinking that everyone was looking at us, which they probably were. The lesson, get the good stuff!
Day 11: Windmills
Today was one of those annoying days where we had to move rooms, which means packing all your stuff and checking out just to undo it again that night, arrg! After that we caught the train to Zaanse Schans, which is a windmill village. We walked around and went into some of the widmills, tried the cheese in their gift shop (and bought some), took some photos in clogs of various sizes and had a look through the not-very-good museum.
After getting the train back to Amsterdam, we stopped in at the Sex Museum because, hey, that's what you do in Amsterdam. Then it was lunch time, Wok to Walk again and then onto a pub for a few beers. The walk home from the pub took us past a waffle place, where we stopped for a waffle with ice-cream and nutella, and because our hostel is in the red light district, we stopped in at a 2 euro peep show so we could say we did it.
Day 12: Anne Frank Huis.... actually no, cheese tasting
It was raining like mad today so when we got to the Anne Frank Huis and saw the massive line we instantly knew that wasn't happening. Instead we went over to a cheese shop that was pointed out to us on the walking tour and luckily, arrived just in time for the cheese tasting session where they let us (in exchange for money) taste 9 different cheeses and some complimenting wines. I really enjoyed most of them, so much so that I bought some afterwards. I also learnt that I can tell you if I like the taste of something, but that's about it. I can't pick if it tastes like chocolate or wood chips or any of the other tastes on the flavour card they gave us.
On the way home from the cheese shop we took refuge from the rain in a cafe and had to try to banana cake and stroopwafels because they smelt so good. We eventually made it back to the hostel but we were saturated so we hung around a bit to get changed and warm up.
In the evening we went for a walk to see a bridge that was decorated with lights and it looked pretty good. To make the walk worth it, we stopped at a local bar and listened to a guitarist play some of his own material. He has some skills and although all the songs he played had negative/depressing themes, he was almost comically sad.
Day 13: Anne Frank Huis, take 2
We tried again today and although the line was still huge, at least it wasn't blowing a gale and raining. The line took about an hour and I have to say, the place was kind of a let down. I'm not really sure what I expected but all the information they give you is pretty boring and I think it's because it's more about the house than the era in time or Anne's story. I can't recommend it.
Lunch was stamppot again, I just couldn't get enough and we also tried a Duvel beer. I'm going to have to start cooking this at home. Later in the afternoon we stopped at a bakery and they do the order food, sit down and eat it, then pay on the way out thing. The problem was we were there for about 2 hours and we forgot to pay when we left although we didn't realise until later that night.
My friend was leaving for England today, on the MegaBus (cool name eh?) so I walked her to the bus stop and that was the highlight of the evening.
Day 14: Family meet-up
Today I was catching up with family that live in Holland and I thought I should bring something so I chose stroopwafels and speculaas biscuits. They're both Dutch foods, which is probably strange of me to bring them along because they all know what they are but in my defence, they're good! On the way back from getting supplies, I stopped by the bakery we forgot to pay at yesterday and paid them. The girl behind the counter gave me the weirdest look, I guess because she wasn't sure why I even came back, but at least I had a clear conscience.
When it came time to head over to the family meeting, I thought I'd give myself lots of time in case something went wrong and I'm lucky I did because I screwed up catching the tram. <Insert excuses about multiple lines sharing the same section of track and not knowing what side of the road they stop on>. The end result was I made it on time so crisis averted. My aunty cooked some amazing Thai food and it was a really fun night with the family.
Day 15: SFA
Not much happened today. I did some blogging and got psyched up for the overnight bus trip to London. I'm not one for sleeping on buses, planes, etc but this MegaBus is far cheaper than the trains and it takes you from Amsterdam to Calias, onto the ferry and right into London so you can't do much better than that.
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| Locks hanging from a bridge |
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| High heeled clogs |
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| Chicken clogs |
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| The animals at the windmill village |
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| Stroopwafels! |
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| The epic clog |
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| Some wooden crocs |
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| Funny shaped vegetables |
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| At the windmill village |
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| and again... |
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| The skinniest house in Amsterdam. Only one window wide. |
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| The wall of fast food windows |
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| Another giant clog! |
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