Amsterdam – August 2018

In August we found ourselves back in Amsterdam. It is definitely a change to visit in the summer rather than the winter. We hadn’t initially planned on visiting again so soon and our visit was supposed to serve a different purpose, but those plans changed abruptly and we couldn’t cancel our tickets so we decided to make the most of it.

We took the train (Thalys) to Amsterdam and once we arrived headed to The Avocado Show for a late breakfast. The meal was pretty good, but the avocados were not quite ripe enough for my dish. It is a cool idea though.

After breakfast we picked up a fresh stroopwafel for dessert at the local market nearby. Yum!

I think there was a drag event or something going on in town because we saw a lot of people dressed up. I haven’t been to a drag show in so long. Need to make that happen sometime.

There was also a little Pinocchio puppet show.

I do love walking around Amsterdam. On our walk we also picked up some Dutch ice cream at Banketbakkerij Van Der Linde (actually more like a thick whipped cream) and it was delicious. I read online that it is vanilla ice cream and whipped cream mixed together, but others say cheese ice cream, so who knows. Regardless of what it actually is, we went back the next day for some more.

That evening we had a scheduled activity of canoeing and a picnic just outside of Amsterdam. The weather had been iffy leading up to the day, but it turned out to be beautiful and we were actually able to see the sunset later. We had to duck forward under the small bridges while paddling.

In this photo you might be able to see that the land the cows are grazing on is a lot lower from where we are paddling. They have to create “new land” as Majel says. Basically they are reclaiming the marsh/wetland from the sea by draining/pumping out the water. These areas of land are called polders if I’m remembering or researching this correctly. A polder is a low-lying tract of land enclosed by dikes that form an artificial hydrological entity, meaning it has no connection with outside water other than through manually operated devices (definition taken from Wikipedia).

The picnic that our guide provided was pretty good and filling. There was also a small windmill near our picnic spot.

It was fun playing with the cows that were there watching us eat haha.

Heading back to the end point, we saw starlings flying through the sky creating those crazy patterns that they create. During the winter Olympics in South Korea, they actually had drones programmed to recreate something like this, but more like images we could actually recognize. However, seeing them in person is way better than any drones! I could not get a proper video, but you can check out this video on YouTube to get an idea of what we saw! https://youtu.be/V4f_1_r80RY

At the bus stop we noticed that it was covered in spiders! Hoping for no crazy spider dreams tonight…

Walking around Amsterdam at night. The last photo is in the red light district.

This is the view from our Airbnb. I had booked the cheapest Airbnb I could find since we were only staying for one night. It ended up being across from a karaoke bar that was open until 4h! Needless to say I didn’t really sleep that well haha. I woke up around 3h and decided to just stay up until the bar closed. Other than this it was an okay room. We just had forgotten to bring earplugs.

While Andrew was getting a coffee, I snapped a picture of this beautiful building.

We had pancakes at Pancakes! Amsterdam for breakfast. It wasn’t really as good as I’d remembered, but I guess nothing usually is, right? Unless Andrew’s cooking, then it is always good (I’m biased though).

Later that morning we took the metro down to Museum Vrolik to see the teratological collection of Gerardus Vrolik and his son Willem Vrolik (both professors of anatomy). Here you could see a variety of deformities including cyclopia and conjoined twins. Other anatomical collections have been added to their initial private collection. There were also a lot of animal skeletons, some with abnormalities. You could also see a man’s leg that had been crushed by a wagon wheel and also see what multiple sclerosis looks like in the spine. It is a fascinating place to spend a few hours. We were technically not allowed to take photos, but if you want to see some of the specimen we might have seen you can check out the TripAdvisor page (not everyone followed the rules): https://www.tripadvisor.fr/Attraction_Review-g188590-d3750026-Reviews-Museum_Vrolik-Amsterdam_North_Holland_Province.html

A couple of the guests on the canoe tour had mentioned a vegan restaurant called Mr. & Mrs. Watson and we thought it sounded interesting so we went to check it out for lunch. It was funny when we arrived because the mother and her son were there waiting for their food. We sat next to them and chatted for a bit. I tried the soup and Andrew had the sloppy cheese steak bun. The food was really good! I’d like to start doing more vegan things at home.

We ended up walking in the area where the Brouwerij ‘t IJ brewery is located so we stopped in and picked up a couple beers to take home for later.

Our last activity of the day was going to the Sex Museum. Our friend, Feruza, had visited years ago with her husband, David, and had kept telling us to check it out. We had some free time so we went for it. It was a lot larger than I expected. People have and always will be obsessed with sex. But that’s why we’re all here so that’s okay with me! To each their own.

There are so many bikes in Amsterdam it is sometimes sickening to look around. It is way cluttered in some places! This is right by the train station. I think it’d be hell to find my bike. Don’t get me wrong, I love biking and would take that or my feet over a car any day, but there’s got to be a better way for storing them. Although if I lived here, I’m sure I’d just get used to it.

Our train back to Paris ended up being late (well I think our actual train ended up being cancelled), but we were able to get on the already late train before ours back to Paris. We were still over 1.5 hours late and barely made it to the metro before it closed to get home. However, we did make it and I’m thankful! It was nice to see Amsterdam again, but it might be awhile before we go back. Too many other places to explore!