Amsterdam!!

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I AMsterdam

Left EARLY from London and loaded the coach to catch the ferry at Dover to Calais, France. Met our wonderful tour guide, Chad, and driver, Jarrod. They were the BEST we could ask for! It was pretty foggy so we couldn't even see the white cliffs of Dover. Don't feel too bad for me though, because 3 weeks later on our return we did get to see them. Sat with Antony on the first bus trip and then sat through a lot "this is me" talks from everyone one the bus and then did some "speed dating" aroudn the bus to get to know some people.
Soon enough we were in Amsterdam. Talk about a location to get to know your fellow travelers. Guess we were all going to get acquainted pretty fast. Got to our hotel which was really nice and cleaned up and headed out for the Chad tour of the red light district. I didn't think I would care all that much about it, but I did want to see it. I mean I had heard all about the girls in the windows and yada yada yada. But, surprisingly, I was actually really disturbed by it all when I saw them first hand. I just couldn't fathom actually choosing to do that for a living...Anyway, interesting stuff, but nothing compared to the sex show that we encountered later on that night. CRAZY! I'll spare you the details. After that adventure, a group of us headed to a cafe and then to The Grasshopper where I got a couple of Heineken's for 14 Euros! I couldn't believe that price-after all, it was brewed down the road! I can buy it cheaper in the States. Nevertheless, I had made it my goal to drink a beer that was brewed in it's native land in every country I was in and I wasn't about to abandon that goal for a couple of Euros. After the Grasshopper we decided to try and find Leinsplein since we had heard it was a pretty fun nightlife. We got lost for awhile navigating our way through the canal filled streets, but finally stumbled upon it and spent some more time drinking and dancing at The Bulldog. Here was where I found out that if you want a Captain and Diet you aren't going to get it. The first time I asked for that the bartender looked at me pretty funny. #1 - there is no Captain Morgan's in Europe (sad sad) and #2 it's not diet coke, it's Coke Light. So I learned to ask for Rum and Coke Light. Good lesson. and it proved to be very useful the next 3 weeks running. When we finally decided to head home we had a hard time finding a taxi that would take 7 of us so we split up into a couple of groups and passed out when we hit the beds. All in all so far, I had a feeling the trip was going to be fun and I didn't need to be worried about being alone.

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Photos

The Guides
Chad and Jarrod

Amsterdam
Courtney, me, Antony, and Siobhan