Europe 2023 - Off to Amsterdam

We left Brussels, Belgium on Saturday morning heading for Amsterdam. We had a couple stops and a couple revelations along the way. We had to go through Rotterdam along the route. We stopped at one of the train stops along the way. I turned to my right and was in shock. The sheer amount of bicycles that were parked at the station was overwhelming! I have never seen so many bicycles in one place. They were stacked on top of each other and we watched as people parked their bikes, locked them and headed to the train station. Oh how I wish I could ride my bike to work, shopping, etc. I was so impressed. It was like seeing the number of cars that are in New York only in bicycle form.

We stayed a little outside of Amsterdam in Bruekelen, and had a 25 minute train ride into the city. We got settled in our hotel and headed out. My first impression of Amsterdam was "WOW". There were a LOT of people walking around, but the architecture was just stunning.

We were only in Amsterdam for two nights (one full day) but we packed so much into the visit. And yes, we did walk through the Red Light District (no pictures from that!).

We ate delicious food and saw amazing sites. One of the most interesting things we did was visit the Anne Frank house where she and her family hid for over two years. We were not allowed to take photos inside the actual hiding place but it was quite emotional to think of her and her family hiding there. I learned that she actually died at the concentration camp where she was taken after they finally found the family. Her father was the only one that survived. At the end of the tour, we were allowed to sign a book. Jim's entry was perfect.

The rest of the visit was a lot of walking and admiring the sites. SO MANY bicycles! And they have the right of way over pedestrians. And they are very serious about this. We saw a man walking down a bicycle lane. He yelled at the bicycle that went passed him. The bicycle rider yelled back and said "This is a roadway!" Jim and I were very careful to look both ways and stay out of the bicycle lanes. There were also a lot of very small cars. Think about a Smart Car cut in half. They were everywhere.

Everything about Amsterdam was great with the exception of the huge swarm of tourists. Just too many for us. But it was still extremely enjoyable and a great experience! The photos below do not do Amsterdam justice but they are a good representation of the sights we saw.

One thing we were initially disappointed in, that ended up turning out to be great was the F1 race. We are huge race fans and had we known the race was going on in the Netherlands, literally 10 miles from where we were, we would have bought tickets. We saw an F1 race in Austria a few years ago and it was amazing. Instead, we stood on the train platform with a huge group of fans going to the race The energy was amazing and were were honestly, envious. But we had already made plans so we continued forward. We sat by two fans on the train and we talked to them about the racers and our travels. They gave us some good recommendations of other places to visit in the area. When we parted ways, we wished them a great day and thanked them for their recommendations.

As we walked around throughout the day, it would rain a little then stop. Then start. Then stop. At one point it was raining fairly steady so we ran to a patio of a bar hoping the rain would stop. It didn't. I looked in the window and saw the race on a large TV. I showed Jim who immediately dragged us inside. We watched most of the race inside the bar, and had a blast! We watched Max Verstappen win the race, and we celebrated with the local fans. It was a great dive bar with fun people. Amsterdam was good to us!

One thing I did NOT like about Amsterdam was the public pissoirs (public men's urinals on the street). It's fine that they have them, but wow do they smell as you walk past them. YUCK! This is not a picture I took but looks exactly like the ones I saw.

The next day we were supposed to head to London but we could not get a train reservation. Instead, we went with Plan B. Between the race fan on the train and the lady at the train station we decided instead of staying another night in Amsterdam we would head to Leiden, Netherlands.

We are always excited to get recommendations from locals so we were excited to see what Leiden was all about. We were not disappointed. We found a nice hotel, took a canal tour, walked all over, saw windmills, ate great food. It is a gorgeous little town and we were so glad to have ventured there.

Love to all! Next up..... London!