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Published: June 24th 2007
And a quick hour flight from Dublin to A.dam.
The journey continued with the train from the airport to the Central Station.
Where I picked up the tram to the Leidesplein.
I got off & walked about a half mile to my hostel. 10 AM!
Although I'm pretty tired at this point & I'm another hour time zone later.
8 hrs to Boulder; 6 hrs to the east coast
Stored my bag & walked the Leidesplein & got some food until I could get into my room for a shower & nap.
Decent hostel, big, sharing with guys from British Columbia & London, a girl from Australia & one from Clifton/Paterson NJ.
Day 2-Continue to rain on & off. Slept in, did some laundry & some more hostel booking. Got a late start but enjoyed walking around.
Day 3-Ate breakfast at the hostel; it is a big & busy facility; all kinds of groups & people coming through. In a good location between beautiful Vondelpark & the busy shop/eatery section of the Leidesplein.
Walked around and took pictures. Amsterdam & the Dutch are impressive. Especially compared to Ireland where the people looked
like they live(d) a hard life & are on the poorer side. The Dutch seem sophisticated, healthy-tall & slim, beautiful & very fashionable, both men & women. And lots of boots! It is amazing how they ride their bikes everywhere & they just hop on all dressed properly without much to do, no special biking clothes, never a helmet and petal off without much effort, young & old & everywhere in between, sometimes you can here them singing, really. The bikes are from another time period (like the 1950's); they are the most unassuming/plain one speed cruiser bikes with kick stands & fenders; no frils, nothing flashy, no fancy locks-they use big heavy chain link. Much the contrast coming from Boulder, CO but these people put us to shame.
Took the Heineken Tour. It was the best one of all; over Coors, Bud & Guiness; not better than my personalized Mahogony Ridge tour though. Thanks Charlie! The "What It's Like To Be A Heineken Bottle" is fun as the floor shakes & moves while you stand for 3 minutes & watch the movie of you, the Heineken bottle, move throughout the factory. Also, it helps that you get THREE
free beers on the tour.
After more walking, lots & lots of good walking. I decided to see Ocean's 13 (in English) w/ Dutch subtitles. I give the movie a B. Walked & snacked a bit more & eventually made it back to the hostel for bed.
Day 4-Had some more hostel breakfast, packed, checked out, checked my bag & had an enjoyable walk through Vondelpark. A big park next to the hostel & the rain finally lifted & the sun is shining. Continued to just walk around & enjoy the city; as I said, I'm not a city person, but this is a cool city. The people seem very happy (and not for the obvious reason you may be thinking); it's clean, great transportation, parks, pretty canals & obviously liberal ideas. Well, eventually I made it back to the hostel, got my backpack & proceeded to walk back towards the train station.
The city center area is layed out like a horseshoe with the open-ended part being the train station, from there, it's a series of canals, in ever-increasing horseshoe size, as you work away from the train station. My hostel was bottom center of the horseshoe,
Amsterdam
Leidespleinabout a half hour walk from the train station. The infamous Red Light District is within 5 minutes of the train station.
So I passed through the RLD one last time for a slice of pizza. No surprise, mixed in with all the coffee shops are storefronts selling donuts, pizza, french fries with mayonaise (it's the A.dam way)... lots of munchies. It rained again, so I ducked in to one last coffee shop before heading over to the train station, about 1 AM. The journey continues...
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Mike & Laura
non-member comment
Nice!
Laura and I are enjoying the trip! Everyplace looks neat! Be safe!