Amsterdam or BUST.

Trip Start Mar 15, 2009
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Trip End Apr 15, 2009


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Flag of Netherlands  , Noord-Holland,
Wednesday, April 1, 2009

Ignoring the obvious reasons why young adults would find Amsterdam fascinating, this city is one of the many in Europe that is completely worth a three day visit. This place is as full of life and fun as any a place I've ever had the privilege to visit. We stayed in an incredibly cheap hostel with 200 European spring-breakers -- they give you a prison cot to sleep on and make you be in bed by a certain time, but the location and the opportunity to wash our rank clothes (which we hadn't washed since we left... yeah... 15 days of stank) totally made up for it. Now, I'm going to impart another piece of travel advice to all of you taking a driving holiday to Europe: When you get into the big city and can't find anywhere to park and you get stuck in traffic for two hours and you resort to throwing marshmellows out the window into truck spokes and you nearly kill six cyclists while your lost in a place you've never fathomed before........... just take it in stride. Needless to say, we got to the hostel, got a parking ticket that I'll never pay, and went out on the town.

Drew has been to Amsterdam before and was able to show us around. Street performers, the Red Light District, the amazing food... no one ever thinks that, among all of these things, Amsterdam would have some of the most brilliant architecture and lighting in Europe. It's truly a humbling place in terms of its Renaissance-esque beauty, but the fun starts at 6:00AM and ends the next day at 6:00AM. John and Drew played a show at a very popular bar in front of a bunch of very enthusiastic customers. I was unable to make it, as I had butchered my toe the night before and could hardly walk, but apparently they kicked it and lots of people gave them compliments.

Unfortunately, Drew had to take off to the airport the next day, but John and I decided to park it for another 24 hours and see the city on foot. I think the novelty about this city was that John and I had a fantastic time *together*. Not like we normally don't, but on this particular day, we really enjoyed each other's company and were very involved in discussing what we thought was neat about our surroundings. The day was absolutely beautiful, and we sat out in Vondel Park giggling and people watching. We saw a lot of extremely interesting characters, including a dude we assumed was a retired Reaggae star (Amsterdam is where they put old Reaggae singers out to pasture, by the way). He was talking to a whole string of people who weren't actually there ("c'mon girl you know you wanna come see this daddy... I won't do ya no harm little girl...") and finger dancing Marvin Gaye-style to the jam. John looked at me and said, "I'll have what that dude's having."

In any case, we don't have many pictures from the city because we were too lazy to get batteries for the camera, but Amsterdam was fantastic. Bikers are the thing to worry about... watch yourself, because just walking down the sidewalk is a feat in itself. You might get killed.

The verdict: One of the coolest places we've ever been, and we WILL be re-visiting.

PS - I'm posting a video that explains what eventually happened to the toe that I ruined on a bike in Ireland. It is ONLY FOR THOSE PEOPLE WITH A STRONG STOMACH, AND THERE IS A VERY BAD BUT VERY WARRANTED CURSE WORD IN IT.
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