Onwards to the low countries – er, I mean the Netherlands.
We've another long driving day in front of us, so I get comfortable in snuggly clothes. After three hours, we stop for lunch. I'm disappointed with the lack of vegetarian options, and invest in a bottle of chocolate milk. It keeps me full, gives me energy, and tastes great (I promise you that no chocolate milk company is sponsoring this post!). I also stock up on the last of German Haribo lollies (I've heard the German ones are the best), and get a little tub of Kaktus for Friends – which are ice cream bites, coated in chocolate. Yum! Marta hands out Ampelmann keychains. Like everything else we choose, Libby and I pick the opposite designs. :-)
We're on the Autobahn, but there's a speed limit of 120 (same as the rest of Europe). I don't get it... I thought Autobahns were speed-limit-less. Our bus can't exceed 100 anyway.
An hour or so away from Amsterdam, we stop at a Cheese and Clogs factory (one of those Topdeck inclusions) where the farmer (owner?) keeps saying things like "little Indian woman hee hee hee". He shows us his wheels of cheese and how he shapes the clogs. It literally takes seconds to shape a block of wood into something clog-like. A few of us feed his calves, and then march over to the windmill to take the corny Hey-I'm-in-Holland shots.
One thing about Amsterdam that I didn't know before planning this trip was that it is built very similar to Venice. It's built on a lagoon, and around 90 islands make up the city. The other thing I didn't know was that it is one of the two places in the world where you can see flying cows (the other being Switzerland). ;-)
We are staying in Zaandam, which is just outside of Amsterdam. The hotel we stay at is by far the coolest looking one, and we stay in the Mustard Poeder room. After quickly freshening up, we bus into the city, and are given a little orientation tour by Marta. We walk through the red light district and to be honest, I was expecting it to be more... I don't know, wilder. A woman yells at one of our group members for standing outside her window. There is an optional activity on tonight – the famed Show. After saying goodbye to around 98% of our group at the show, four of us wander around Amsterdam. The smell of weed is everywhere, and it makes me want to gag.
After dinner, we don't really feel like waiting around for the rest of the group, so we walk to the Centraal station. After a little panic attack where we can't get the train door open, we get off at Zaandam and retire for the night.
It's the next morning, and get this: for breakfast in Amsterdam, they eat bread with butter and chocolate sprinkles! It's called Hagelslag, and it's legit a thing people do! So of course I have do it, too. :-)
I have plans to go on a bike tour this morning, a Topdeck optional activity. Libby doesn't, so we plan to meet in the city. The bike tour is – unexpectedly – a lot of fun. The tour guide Karl, who is British, is hilariously inappropriate. He takes us through the narrow streets of Amsterdam, over the canals and under the Rijksmuseum, blowing bubbles and ringing bells, through Vondelpark, to a little cafe which serves apple turnover to die for, and past the Anne Frank Huis, which has a very long queue outside (I guess Libby and I won't be going there today). Huffing and puffing, I make it back to where we started. Good ol' Karl gives me a bike bell to keep as a souvenir.
I wait around outside the Rijksmuseum, but it looks like Libby and I have missed each other by minutes. I cannot see her in the crowd, and decide to explore the city on my own. I wander around the shopping district, and get to the flower markets. One of the places in the market has hundreds of dried flowers hanging from the ceiling. It's mesmerising.
I am all museum-ed out, I don't feel like shopping, I can't get into the Anne Frank Huis, and I am not sightseeing by my lonesome in the red light district. What to do?! I buy Diary of a Young Girl, and pick a quiet canal. And I sit on the canal's edge reading Anne Frank's diary. It is peaceful. Quiet. The petals from the Elm trees dance on the breeze. The canal is quite busy, but I can get used to the gentle lapping sounds of this traffic.
After spending a couple of hours in this blissful fashion, I decide to come back to 2015. I get a juice in a swish department store, and chat to the girl that serves me. She's Indian, but she was born and brought up in Amsterdam. She's super sweet, and we end up becoming Facebook friends. The locals here seem quite chatty, actually. I'm sitting on the terrace sipping juice when a couple of women next to me start up a conversation with me because they find my eyes very interesting!
In the evening, I meet everyone at Centraal station and we go for our canal cruise for our last ever dinner together as a group! The cruise is nice, but the dinner is terrible! It's some sort of asian food, and the vegetarian options are seriously lacking. After dinner, everyone heads out for a night out, and Libby and I train back to Zaandam. It feels like a very cruisy day overall, and I do up enjoying it.
We've another long driving day in front of us, so I get comfortable in snuggly clothes. After three hours, we stop for lunch. I'm disappointed with the lack of vegetarian options, and invest in a bottle of chocolate milk. It keeps me full, gives me energy, and tastes great (I promise you that no chocolate milk company is sponsoring this post!). I also stock up on the last of German Haribo lollies (I've heard the German ones are the best), and get a little tub of Kaktus for Friends – which are ice cream bites, coated in chocolate. Yum! Marta hands out Ampelmann keychains. Like everything else we choose, Libby and I pick the opposite designs. :-)
We're on the Autobahn, but there's a speed limit of 120 (same as the rest of Europe). I don't get it... I thought Autobahns were speed-limit-less. Our bus can't exceed 100 anyway.
An hour or so away from Amsterdam, we stop at a Cheese and Clogs factory (one of those Topdeck inclusions) where the farmer (owner?) keeps saying things like "little Indian woman hee hee hee". He shows us his wheels of cheese and how he shapes the clogs. It literally takes seconds to shape a block of wood into something clog-like. A few of us feed his calves, and then march over to the windmill to take the corny Hey-I'm-in-Holland shots.
One thing about Amsterdam that I didn't know before planning this trip was that it is built very similar to Venice. It's built on a lagoon, and around 90 islands make up the city. The other thing I didn't know was that it is one of the two places in the world where you can see flying cows (the other being Switzerland). ;-)
We are staying in Zaandam, which is just outside of Amsterdam. The hotel we stay at is by far the coolest looking one, and we stay in the Mustard Poeder room. After quickly freshening up, we bus into the city, and are given a little orientation tour by Marta. We walk through the red light district and to be honest, I was expecting it to be more... I don't know, wilder. A woman yells at one of our group members for standing outside her window. There is an optional activity on tonight – the famed Show. After saying goodbye to around 98% of our group at the show, four of us wander around Amsterdam. The smell of weed is everywhere, and it makes me want to gag.
After dinner, we don't really feel like waiting around for the rest of the group, so we walk to the Centraal station. After a little panic attack where we can't get the train door open, we get off at Zaandam and retire for the night.
It's the next morning, and get this: for breakfast in Amsterdam, they eat bread with butter and chocolate sprinkles! It's called Hagelslag, and it's legit a thing people do! So of course I have do it, too. :-)
I have plans to go on a bike tour this morning, a Topdeck optional activity. Libby doesn't, so we plan to meet in the city. The bike tour is – unexpectedly – a lot of fun. The tour guide Karl, who is British, is hilariously inappropriate. He takes us through the narrow streets of Amsterdam, over the canals and under the Rijksmuseum, blowing bubbles and ringing bells, through Vondelpark, to a little cafe which serves apple turnover to die for, and past the Anne Frank Huis, which has a very long queue outside (I guess Libby and I won't be going there today). Huffing and puffing, I make it back to where we started. Good ol' Karl gives me a bike bell to keep as a souvenir.
I wait around outside the Rijksmuseum, but it looks like Libby and I have missed each other by minutes. I cannot see her in the crowd, and decide to explore the city on my own. I wander around the shopping district, and get to the flower markets. One of the places in the market has hundreds of dried flowers hanging from the ceiling. It's mesmerising.
I am all museum-ed out, I don't feel like shopping, I can't get into the Anne Frank Huis, and I am not sightseeing by my lonesome in the red light district. What to do?! I buy Diary of a Young Girl, and pick a quiet canal. And I sit on the canal's edge reading Anne Frank's diary. It is peaceful. Quiet. The petals from the Elm trees dance on the breeze. The canal is quite busy, but I can get used to the gentle lapping sounds of this traffic.
After spending a couple of hours in this blissful fashion, I decide to come back to 2015. I get a juice in a swish department store, and chat to the girl that serves me. She's Indian, but she was born and brought up in Amsterdam. She's super sweet, and we end up becoming Facebook friends. The locals here seem quite chatty, actually. I'm sitting on the terrace sipping juice when a couple of women next to me start up a conversation with me because they find my eyes very interesting!
In the evening, I meet everyone at Centraal station and we go for our canal cruise for our last ever dinner together as a group! The cruise is nice, but the dinner is terrible! It's some sort of asian food, and the vegetarian options are seriously lacking. After dinner, everyone heads out for a night out, and Libby and I train back to Zaandam. It feels like a very cruisy day overall, and I do up enjoying it.
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