Day 50

Today was our last day at the beach in Zandvoort. We’ve found a lot of favorites in Zandvoort and we wanted to do some of them again to celebrate the amazing time that we had here.

We started the day at our favorite beach, an easy bike ride from the house. Luckily we’re leaving the beach today because the beach food is not giving us “beach bodies” (and Cameron is sick of the statement, “my body is at the beach that makes it a beach body”). We enjoyed frites with sauce, both curry and mayo/ketchup.

A little while later we enjoyed kibbeling. We bought it from one of the trailers that is pulled down the beach by a tractor. It was delicious!

We stayed on the beach all afternoon and we were rewarded with one more sunset. The sky did not disappoint.

We have really enjoyed our time in Zandvoort and would definitely come back!

Day 51

Moving days are the worst.  Our backpacks aren’t too heavy but we definitely don’t want to carry them around wandering for hours. We said good bye to our host Erick. (He has been our favorite so far.) And we headed out to catch our first bus.

We found the first bus easily. And then the 2nd bus too. The third bus was where the wheels came off, figuratively speaking, we found it easily enough but we were only going 2 stops which caught us by surprise. We missed our stop. Fortunately we had gotten a pass that was good for 90 minutes so it didn’t cost us any extra to get off the bus at the next stop (8-10 blocks away), cross the street, and ride the same route back the other way.

We found our next AirBnb easily. Overall it was a pretty easy moving day! Or maybe we are getting better at moving.

Our room is a kind of converted attic on the third floor, up two flights of a very narrow spiral staircase. The place is nice. We don’t have a kitchen but we have a mini fridge and a microwave. This place comes with a dog, Simba, a Rhodesian Ridgeback who is very mercurial about when it is necessary to announce your comings and goings. Our AirBnb host left a plastic bag of dog treats outside for us to use in winning over the Lion King.

We went to the grocery store to get some basics (peanut butter, jelly, coffee, etc). In Zandvoort we had noticed the little coffee area at the store. This store has one too!

Today it was 93 in Amstelveen (where they don’t believe in AC) and 92 in Houston. *sigh* But, with very little moving about, we survived. It eventually started raining over night which helped cool off the place a bit.

We were appreciating the rain until it started coming in through one of the windows! There is always an adventure to be had.

Day 52

Now that we are closer to  Amsterdam we are planning to go in to the city each day. When we were in London we didn’t get a city pass because so many of the museums and attractions are free. In Amsterdam all of the museums cost money so we decided to go with the I Amsterdam Pass. First thing we did this morning was go pick that up. So. Many. Tourists.

We have tried to stay away from tourists who are in a big hurry because they are only in a place for a week. We were also spoiled by there being very few tourists in Zandvoort. All of that was made up for at the I Amsterdam office. We were over it by the time we got in line. But we persisted, got our passes, and got away from all the crowds.

Last night we luckily got a ticket to the Van Gogh museum today at 3:00. (We also learned that for Van Gogh and the Anne Frank House you are supposed to plan ahead at least a few months. oops!) We had some time to kill before the Van Gogh museum and decided to check out the Sex Museum.

The museum had lots of history of the sex industry in Amsterdam as well as lots of penises (yes there was googling just now to figure out the plural of penis…). There was a whole exhibit on condoms and a lot of creepy animatronics. The best one was a trench coat flasher that was on a motion sensor and flashed everytime someone walked by him.

After the museum we walked to the Van Gogh museum rather than taking the tram to begin to get a feel for the city. We stopped to get some street food and ended up getting a meatball sandwich. It was satisfying but hopefully we find better food in the coming days.

The Van Gogh Museum was good. It was one of the more crowded museums we had been to yet, with a moving line to walk past the major works. We didn’t get the audio tour for 5 euros and instead tried to use the app. This app was not the best, but, in a pinch, there was free wifi, and a youtube video of a tour, it just may or may not have been up to date/in order. But that just made finding the painting the video was talking about a scavenger hunt!

No pictures were allowed inside the museum but there was a cool exhibit on the bottom floor, Van Gogh Dreams. There was audio and lots of trippy images.

After the museum we were hungry again but hadn’t gotten the lay of the area quiet yet. Rather than walking around trying to find somewhere (and getting hangry) we settled for hotdogs outside the museum. They actually really hit the spot. There was a whole bar of toppings and we both got a little adventurous getting sprinklings of things we weren’t quite sure what they were.

After the hot dogs it was still early and with the I Amsterdam Pass your hours start counting down as soon as you use it for the first time. We wanted to get the most out of our passes so we decided to do a canal cruise this evening. It looks really sunny in the pictures but it was actually starting to rain which helped us be decisive in getting on a covered boat.

Anytime Katie sees something that looks old or like it might have been important at some point she says, “Look, that’s a thing.” Basically she is the worst tour guide ever.

Overall our food choices today were pretty questionable. For dinner we had New York Pizza (the original). It tasted like midwest pizza not NYC. Katie looked it up while we were eating and the chain started in the Netherlands not NYC. Should have known.

We made it back home with phones below 10%. Tomorrow we’re (aka Katie is) going to plan better so that we know of good restaurants around and have our battery pack!

Day 53

Day 2 of I Amsterdam pass! The pass is awesome because we are able to go lots of places and not worry about the cost.

But before anything Cameron always needs coffee. We started the day at Het Ballonetje for coffee. There was a group of 60ish year old men enjoying their morning coffee and speaking in Dutch. We had fun trying to piece together their conversation from body language and the few Dutch words that we caught.

First thing we did was go to the ARTIS Zoo! If there is one regret from London it’s not going to the zoo (but it wasn’t in the budget). The zoo was awesome. The little differences from zoos we have been to in the States were so interesting.

Some of the enclosures had pathways so that you could walk all the way around/through them. The parents had to pull their kids around in tiny two wheeled seats that balanced up right when the kids weren’t in them.

The food at the zoo cafe was pretty good (Dutch Appletaart!) and we were surprised at how active most of the animals were.

More elephant action in the video below. (apologies that it is vertical)

Next we went to NEMO Science Center. The website said it was for “kids and adults alike”. But we think they meant it was for kids and people with kids would enjoy playing with their kids aka it was definitely more kid centered. Their intended audience aside, we enjoyed ourselves and tried not to push too many little kids out of the way to check out some of the cooler exhibits.

After the science museum we went to Hortus Botanicus. It is a Botanical garden that has thousands of plant species right in the middle of Amsterdam.

We enjoyed some of the plants outside until it started sprinkling. We headed into the indoor portion to wait out the rain. The building has three different climates. We started with the desert.

Mistakes were made. We didn’t actually look up restaurants that would be near the attractions that we were seeing. As we wandered in the rain we popped into Wagamama for dinner. It’s a chain, which isn’t our favorite but it was dry inside. Our standards are pretty low when getting away from the rain is involved. But, it turned out to be a decent choice anyway.

When we left dinner the rain had abated. Minutes into our walk it started again. We ducked into Primark to escape the rain with about 50 other people. We did a little shopping and then decided to brave the rain again.

As we got close to Central Station a woman asked Katie something in Spanish. Katie gave her a blank stare and then the woman asked Cameron, “-indistinguishable words-… barrio roja.” Cameron said we weren’t from there. As we walked away we thought through what she was trying to ask us and figured out that she was asking about the Red Light District. Bilingual communication…almost.

Day 54

We are trying to make the most of this I Amsterdam city pass. Today we went to Rijksmuseum and then Stedelijk. Rijksmuseum is an overview of Dutch history through art while Stedelijk is a modern and contemporary art museum. They were very different but we enjoyed both quite a bit.

Below are some of our favorites from the Rijksmuseum.

Stedelijk stays open until 10pm on Fridays so we had ourselves a lovely date night and stayed there pretty late. Here are some of our favorites from Stedelijk.

One of the Studio Drift exhibits had described an event they were planning to do for the next three nights over the river. The Studio Drift team had programmed 300 drones to autonomously swarm while doing a light show. Unfortunately it was raining so we didn’t get to see the drones tonight. We might try again tomorrow.

We did take a walk through the Red Light district. On the way there we stopped to get food. A little bit because we were hungry and a little because it started raining hard again. We went to Destra del Ponte which is Italian. After we sat down Katie looked it up on Trip Advisor. It was right in the middle of restaurants listed so we set our expectations low. And then we were pleasantly surprised! Katie had the Carbonara and Cam had Bolognese Tortellini. Both were yummy. The Carbonara was saucy and delicious, while Cam said this Bolognese might be 2nd best on his list so far.

After dinner we walked to the main part of the Red Light District. It was basically how you’d imagine it. We saw all the ladies in windows and enjoyed people watching all the different sorts out and about on the street.

Day 55

There are so many options with the I Amsterdam Pass it would be impossible to do them all even with the 96 hour pass. We have tried to narrow down the ones we really want to do but we are also not trying to rush through the places just to check them off the list. #balance

Today we went to the Willet House. It is a fully furnished canal house from the 18th century. We learned a lot about what life was like for the servants of wealthy families like this and the family themselves. Secret doorways allowed the staff/family to get around the house without interacting with each other. The coach driver, who lived in a smaller house past the garden, was on call day or night to bring the coach around whenever the family rang a bell. As for the family, the man of the house decided not to follow the family calling of being a doctor and instead decided he just wanted to collect art.

After the Willet House we headed towards the Hermitage but with a detour to the Skinny Bridge. The story of this bridge goes that there were two wealthy sisters on either side of the Amstel River and they built the bridge to be able to visit each other. It is called the “Skinny Bridge” because although the sisters were wealthy they couldn’t afford a huge bridge big enough for public use. We found out later that this is just what they tell tourists. The bridge is named because originally a grand bridge had been planned but then because of the economy a smaller/skinny bridge was built by the city.

We went to De Margere Brug Cafe across the street from the bridge.

After lunch we headed to the Hermitage museum. The Hermitage of Amsterdam, is a branch of the Hermitage in Saint Petersburg, Russia. We were impressed by the presentation of this museum. From the audio tour that included musical selections to accompany the art, to the light show in the portrait gallery that highlighted and gave the details of the people depicted. Unfortunately, we did not set aside enough time for how large this museum was and were getting rushed out the door by security at closing time.

After the Hermitage we went to Micropia which is the only museum in the world devoted to micro organisms. When you go in you get a petri dish shaped booklet. Throughout the museum you stamp different microorganisms on your booklet. As we learned about microorganisms we tried not to think about how many were living on each of the stamps. Ewww!

Katie got all of her stamps and Cameron learned some things about microbes. (Such as: There is as much poop bacteria on coins as there is on bathroom doorknobs as both are often touched but rarely cleaned. Also, antibiotic soap does little to nothing, whereas probiotic soap is fairly effective.) All in all a good museum adventure! Afterwards we got coffee and then checked out the red light district a little more. There is so much people watching to do in this area. We got meringues and snacks from a bakery near by and headed to watch the drones (that we had heard about at the art museum).

We did lots of googling/searching on social media to figure out the best spot to watch the show. But the best spot according to the interwebs was far away. We had already walked a lot, so we picked a spot by the river and crossed our fingers that we would be able to see. As we sat there enjoying our snacks and waiting for the show lots of other people milled around pondering aloud if it would be a good spot.

The drone show was neat. We were a little far away, so the video isn’t great but we really enjoyed it.

Day 56

Today was the last day of our I Amsterdam Pass. We started the day at the Holocaust Museum. The museum was intense to say the least. It is in the building where Jewish people were housed before they left for the concentration camps. The museum is pretty small but they are planning to add on and have a full museum by 2021. We definitely want to come back then.

After the Holocaust Museum we went to the Dutch Resistance Museum. This museum gave a lot more history on what different groups of people were doing during the holocaust. Throughout the museum they asked the question, if you were in their position, would you adjust, collaborate, or resist?

At the museum Katie bought a book about Amsterdam’s history. We headed to a near by park to read. We found out this is actually the first public park in Amsterdam. We read/drew by the canal for a while.

We did take out for dinner. It was interesting, different and we probably wouldn’t do it again. But everything is a new experience! Hopefully better food experiences are in our near future.

Netherlands