Amsterdam - Nantes

It's time to finally finish the trip blog. It has been a couple months, so I am mostly just summarizing for posterity.

So...Amsterdam. Does it live up to the hype? Somewhat. There are "coffee shops" every few feet and enough sex shops to make the host of Talk Sex blush, but unless you go to the more shady areas of the town you are unlikely to find naked women dancing in the windows.

We stayed in another youth hostel, this time for two days. We ate at two different places while in Amsterdam, Burger King and some Italian restaurant. An interesting note about people in the Netherlands is that they love mayonnaise on everything. When I asked for our burgers to be cheese and ketchup only, there was still a generous helping of mayo. I guess to them the white stuff is as intrinsic as the bun is.

The Italian place was cheap and tasted excellent. By the time we ate here we were heavily exhausted after nearly 5 days of constant walking so it was a much-needed slice of luxury.

The highlights of our visit in Amsterdam were our visits to the Torture museum and the Sex museum - both on Halloween, no less.

After two abhorrently long train rides from Amsterdam to Nantes, we finally made it back home.

Traveling is NOT EASY!!! As much as people like to scoff at guided tours, there is a reason we need them. It is unbelievably hard to get around on your own and it is much more expensive than sight-seeing in groups.

Right now we are in Wales enjoying Christmas and New Year's with Laura's family. She will most likely have a good post about it in the days to come.

Cheerio.

"Career"

No matter what I do, it must be something which allows me to make people laugh.
Having a career which wouldn't permit me to make people laugh would kill me.

Brussels-Antwerp-Rotterdam-Den Haag

Between Brussels and Amsterdam there is not much to say, but I am still going to fill in the blanks to get you up to speed.

We first stopped in Antwerp, the supposed diamond trading capital of the world. We only stayed for a few hours, but during this time we saw no less than 15 different diamond stores and showcases in one square kilometer. We had our first Belgian waffles, and left for Rotterdam.

Rotterdam was our first step into the Netherlands. The most noticeable thing was the copious amount of bicycles. I had read that Amsterdam has a ton of bikes, but when we first arrived in Rotterdam I was hard-pressed to believe any other place could have more in such a small area. Taking some leftover bread we had saved from Strasbourg, we went and fed some birds on a bridge. Rotterdam is a very pretty city and has a much more small-town feel than the other places we have visited. The only real peculiarity I noticed was the public urinals for men. They were literally TOTALLY public.

We got a small bite to eat at Mcdonald's, but essentially simply to use the restroom. While there, this 2 year old boy started talking to me in Dutch while watching All Dogs Go To Heaven. To him, what he had to tell me seemed very important, so I listened attentively. Try as I might, I couldn't understand him...because he had his pacifier in his mouth...yeah. I quickly took my leave when I noticed his grandmother glaring at me.

We went to a street market to look at the wares. I saw a tent selling some tasty looking chicken, and Laura agreed that we should have some. Unfortunately for me, I did not even know how to count to 2 in Dutch. I decided I would go with French first. "Parlez-vous Francais?" I received a no. Oh good! They must speak English! "Do you speak English?" A woman in the tent began laughing and said, "Nooooo." I was screwed. I pointed at the chicken and held up two fingers and I was served with a wink. At least I knew "Danke" from the trash cans at McDonald's.

Before setting out on the trip I wanted to see The Hague really bad, but when we arrived in Den Haag, I changed my mind. I simply wanted to go on to our last stop...

Amsterdam.