The Great Europe Adventure: Amsterdam

I left Amsterdam very early on Tuesday morning, and Holly meet me at Amsterdam Centraal. Holly's friend, Sonya, is studying abroad in Amsterdam, so we first took my stuff to her place and decided to grab lunch in the area. It was the first time in days I'd been able to afford real food, so I got this "warm meat sandwich with peanut sauce on a soft roll." It was really good, and I got a couple traditional puff pancakes for dessert. It was the first time I'd really felt full in days.

Holly and I decided we would go to the flower market, find this chip place she wanted to try, go to this local market, and go to the Rijksmuseum. The flower market was a lot of fun, but it was very small. Ultimately, we wandered off to central Amsterdam to find chips with peanut sauce (the Dutch love peanut butter, apparently).

We wandered around for about an hour, going up and down the same tiny side streets, and were entirely unable to find the chip place again. We ended up getting chips at a cafe by the Nieuwmarkt. As we later discovered, we walked very close to the chip place several times.

After chips, we walked down to the flea market. It was really strange and eclectic and sold everything from miscellaneous fish parts to clothing and beyond. From there, we went straight to the Rijksmuseum.

Here's my major problem with Amsterdam: the cost of the museums. It was the exact reverse of Belgium. The Rijksmuseum, for example, was 12.50EUR, and it was surprisingly small. There were two floors, perhaps three or four rooms on each floor. The first floor had some paintings and relics (is that the right word?) from Amsterdam's history. The second floor was entirely art.

Really, the major selling point of the museum is its collection of Vermeer and Rembrandt paintings. The Rijksmuseum houses the Night Watch. We were in the museum until closing, as we wanted to get our money's worth.

At this point, we got in touch with our CouchSurfing host, Joke (pronounced Yoka). We went back to Sonya's place to get our stuff (about 30 min. walk) and ran down to the Vondelpark to meet Joke. Walking, we would not have made it in time, so we decided to take the tram... Each ride was 2.60EUR and the operator kept giving us wrong directions to the park. We eventually got there and met up with Joke.

From there, we went back to her place. She lives above a model train store, and every time we went in and out, we had to close the storefront gate. It was kinda cool, but in the evening, when we just wanted to go to sleep, it was a bit annoying. Her apartment building was really cool and like nothing I'd ever seen before. Each floor of the building was a separate flat, but besides locking bedroom doors (and, thankfully, a locking bathroom door), there's is no separation between the flats.

We hung out with Joke and had dinner at a nearby cafe. We were all going to meet up with Sonya to see a jazz performance at a nearby bar. Joke decided not to go, as she had work the next day, but Holly and I had already committed and decided to go for a little bit.

It was fun, but I used the bar's wireless to get in touch with Riha back home to discuss housing, as the draw was the next day. When I returned, I kept falling asleep, despite the loud music, so Holly and I decided to leave.

Joke had a hammock and an air mattress, so I slept in the hammock and Holly slept on the air mattress in a sleeping bag. The hammock was orange, my pillow was yellow, and the curtains in the room were red. The next morning when I woke up, I'd wrapped the pillow (and part of the hammock) around my head, and I was really confused that the world was so... orange. Other than that (and occasionally being cold -- I need to get a travel sleeping bag), I slept really well.

The next day, we walked down to another market, where we got a gift for Joke, and Holly found a post office to mail some of her purchases back to London. Afterwards, we explored central Asmterdam a bit more, but Holly was apparently having a bad day because a bird pooped on her head. We stopped at a cafe, so she could use the bathroom to wash up. We got drinks (they don't serve tap water -- only bottled -- in Amsterdam), but Holly spilled her red soda drink all over her white skirt. We decided to go back to Joke's for a bit so that Holly could change.

In the afternoon, we met up with Sonya and went to the Werf, the wharf in Amsterdam. It used to be a squatter community in the 80's, but the government gave them some money to build up the place and there's a cool art community there now (although the abandoned warehouse feel still remains). We had a light dinner in a cafe that was converted from an old industrial greenhouse.

Afterwards, Holly and I ran to the Anne Frank House (we'd been putting it off to avoid the line -- which is typically wrapped around the block). We both agreed that it was something we needed to experience, but we were a bit disappointed. All the furniture was removed, and the tourists were AWFUL. They were very pushy (in fact, in the ticket line, this guy just kept leaning on me -- literally leaning), and the lareg number of people in such a small place made it really hard to fully appreciate the exhibits.

Holly left for Hamburg this morning, and I'm leaving for Paris in about an hour, actually. This morning, after I dropped off Holly at the train station and dumped my bags in a luggage locker, I went to the Van Gogh Museum (14EUR). Of the three, this was my absolute favorite. The crowds were, again, insane, but this museum had the space to accommodate the crowd (and as I got there 30 minutes before opening, I was one of the first people in). The exhibits were informative (and I wasn't going to pay the extra 5EUR for an audiotour) and quite extensive. I spent most of the morning there.

I eventually decided to find a cafe where I could get some vegetables (I haven't been able to find anything green to eat in days. Over lasagna (with aubergine, thank you) and soup, I wrote out my postcards. Now I'm just killing time until my train.

I'm really excited for Paris. As much as I liked Amsterdam, it definitely isn't my favorite city. It's not very walkable (the canals make walking routes very indirect) and the public transit is unreliable. Plus, I couldn't afford to go to many museums because each was 1/3 or more of my daily budget...

More updates to follow!