Amsterdam

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I rode from north France to Amsterdam today it was a nice ride little cloudy but no rain and smooth riding. I was following my GPS as always and it told me my destination was like 1/2 mile short of where I was going so I had to do the whole lost tourist drive. But it was a small back road so there was nobody behind me so that made it less stressful. I found the Hostel and parked my bike and checked in. Now this was my first hostel experience so I had no idea what to expect, like NO idea. But it was cool they had a full kitchen area so you could go buy groceries and make your own meals. And during breakfast time they have the stuff out so you could make eggs and pancakes on your own. They also had pet ducks, and that was the best part pet freaking ducks. Now the hostel was a little outside of the city but it was near the train station and they had a shuttle that went to and from the train.

After getting settled I get on the shuttle and head over to the train. It’s all in Dutch or whatever language they speak so I apparently bought the wrong ticket so I just wait and slip in the gate after someone else opens it. I wasn’t about to buy another ticket for something I had already bought they got their money just not for the right train. So I get to the city and come up from the underground and the first thing I notice is the smell of the city. Now every city has a smell some good some bad some just eh barely noticeable. But Amsterdam it hit me like a wall just weed like everywhere, it all smelled so good, never done the drugs but I have rolled around in a lot of pot plants in Afghanistan and I love the smell, someone should make weed into and air freshener. So I have no idea what to do in this city I have been told about the red light district so I figure I will wander around and see if I can find it. I walked all over the place and didn’t find anything but pubs and weed. So I decide to go into and Irish pub because they always have the best beers. And the one I found here was no different I can’t decide what beer to try so I just work my way from one end of the tap to the other end. I don’t remember what I ate there but I remember it being good so probably a burger. Here I found a beer called Leffe Blonde, it is a 6% ABV beer and it had a sweet taste to it like a soda with alcohol, it was good. I also had my first cider; I had no idea what cider was doing in a pub near the beer. But it is fermented cider so it is like 5%ABV and it has the taste of wine with the flavor of apples and a little carbonation. It was really odd, goodish but not my bag. So I spent the rest of the night here at this pub and talking to the locals and having a good time. Finally I am pretty messed up and decide to wander off, I make my way to the train and buy the wrong ticket again, it was a different ticket because it opened up the gate foe me but when the train got back to my stop it wouldn’t let me out so I had to slip out behind someone else who opened it. Now the hostel people told me that the shuttle stops at x hour but I didn’t know when it was so I am just hoping that it is there, and it was! I was so happy to see the shuttle, apparently it was the last one for the night and I was the only person to get in. On the ride back I explain how I wandered around for a few hours and never found the red light district. Apparently this is odd because everybody else that wanders aimlessly ends up there so it was a good laugh.

The next day I get up to find that I almost missed breakfast but I score some grub and find out they have a bicycle tour every Saturday for only €10. So naturally I figure this to be a good idea and reserve my spot. For the tour they say it’s like 4 hours and mostly flat so in my still half drunken state I figure I can handle this. We head off and it’s explained how the entire country is below sea level and that there are two kinds of windmills. One kind is what I thought they were all for making flour and grinding grains and such. The other is like a pump house to keep the water levels down and prevent flooding. All of the canals we passed and rode along the water level were higher than the ground level by an average of 4 feet. We say a lot of cool windmills, went inside of one, and got all the beer out of my system through exercise. It was a really good tour especially for the price.

After I decided to go back to the city and do some more wandering, I was told of a good Chinese place to check out so after some wandering and drinking I found it and it was really good food, it was super spicy and really flavorful. After I ate I just started walking around some more and eventually found the red light district. It was really funny because it was literally one street over from one of the roads I was on yesterday. I found a pub and got some of the best Heineken ever. I mean I don’t like Heineken but since it was so close to the source it was amazing. I wandered up and down the strip and all the doors with the girls have signs that say no photographs, I thought it was one of those "whatever" rules. But I kid you not I saw some guy take a picture and the girl came outside grabbed the camera and threw it in the canal, it was freaking hilarious. All the girls are in the windows in skimpy bikinis and lingerie the views were nice, did some window shopping but of course didn’t go inside any. I wandered around some more and found another cool pub that had some great beers I even found Carlsberg in there so I stayed there for a while and finished off the night. This time I set an alarm so I didn’t miss the last shuttle for the hostel and finally bought the right ticket for the train and made it to my nice warm bed. Amsterdam is freaking awesome it’s a great place to stay and the hostel was Lucky Lake Hostel with the pet ducks.

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Photos

Windmill
This was the first windmill that I saw in the Netherlands.

This is some castle that just looked really cool

Me outside of one of the many windmills I saw that day.