Europe - Amsterdam: The Rest

After landing in Amsterdam Jen and I spent the day exploring the city on foot. It was basically a walk around. There isn't much to say about the trip itself. This is the second time I have been in Amsterdam, but the last time I was here on a Sunday morning with my dad's cousin. Since I didn't have family tagging along this time I could go crazy.

And not really.

We began our walk along a walking tour according to my Lonely Planet. But we soon departed on our own path and ate at a small restaurant along one of the ring canals. Then we continued our walk to the Red Light District were I insisted on seeing the part of the district that surrounded an awesome church. I find this weird. We did take a tour of the church, though. Afterwards both of use were getting kind of tired, so we headed back to the hostel to officially check in. After that, I broke down and took a nap. I shouldn't have, but it did energize me. So Jen and I left and had dinner just south of the hostel in a young part of town. We walked back to the hostel and had some drinks in the downstairs bar. It was happy hour, so it was packed. We then headed to bed.

The next day I wanted to go on the Heineken Brewery Tour. Actually, it wasn't the Brewery anymore. It was just a visitors place. But I didn't care. I got 3 free drinks of beer and Jen gave me her free drinks, also.

I then went to the Van Gogh Museum a little tipsy.

That night we went out with a kid we met from Minnesota and another guy we met from London. Chase wanted a hash brownie. It was his one goal. So we basically went to the red light district. What more could you want - prostitutes and pot. So we got some drinks and Chase got his brownie. We missed the last tram to the hostel, so we enjoyed a night walk back to the hostel.

Amsterdam's a good city. The one thing you notice are all the bikes. Its almost comparable to Asia. The bike lanes are a given on all streets. The bikes themselves are awesome. They all look like they are ten years old, they all are one speed, and they have a rack on the back tire to carry things. Oh, and they all come equipped with bike bells. Pretty awesome.

During this time I was trying to get a hold of my friend Mathias. We were able to talk on the phone and decided that he was going to be in Berlin that weekend. So, the next morning Jen and I departed for a train to Berlin.