Amsterdam: Sex Drugs and Bicycles

 Feb 24

Amsterdam home to many vices and lots of bikes. We arrived into Amsterdam and jumped onto the last bus for a couple of hours from the Airport into Amsterdam. A country wide strike by the drivers was in effect and only limited service was available. Fortunately  the bus also stopped out front of our hotel where a bunch of people were getting there weed buzz on for the night. Smell of pot is generally everywhere, we didn’t participate but may be had the effects of second hand smoke. Bikes are everywhere so your head has to be in a constant swivel  when crossing streets as bike lanes are everywhere. They say the people of the Netherlands are the fittest in the world because of there biking culture.

Friday night in Amsterdam is full of tourists (Brits)coming into party for the weekend. We walked down to the Red Light district and saw many aspects of the sex industry. The area along the canals was absolutely packed with bars, strip joints and the ladies of the night standing in front windows of there offices showing off their attributes to future customers. Sorry but no pictures were taken.

Feb 25

Off to another Museum we went to the Rijks a huge  museum with a lot of history about the Netherland with lots of artifacts and paintings.  Their  history and museums are very good but not most of the artifacts were not nearly as old as the other places we visited generally only 300-400 years old and lacked  the grandeur of the painters and buildings that we saw in other cities. We then headed over to Anne Frank Museum it was a very good display of the house where Anne and her family hid from the Germans for two years before being caught and sent to a Nazi death camp. A very somber visit. 

With more walking around we came across the Nieuwekerk which is the nations premier church that contains a display about  Queen Juliana nations queen. She was the peoples queen the total opposite of Elizabeth she wanted to be relatable and dressed down went to University and didn’t like all the pomp and circumstance that came with being a queen. She actually moved to Canada during WW2 and lived near Ottawa and returned after the war. The Nazis as usual were extremely ruthless to the people of the Netherlands. When Juliana returned from Canada she was a spokeswoman for world peace and collaboration… we could use her today. 

Queen Juliana

Feb 26

Our last day in Amsterdam before we fly out early on the 27th today we visited the Royal Palace a beautiful building with a great audio guided tour we got there early and very few people were there to it was nice to visit without the crowds. Coming to Amsterdam of course we did the canal cruise a 90 minute tour through some of the canals and around the waterfront areas. We then headed out to see the Heineken experience at the original factory that has been converted into museum. Another interesting building with lots of history but the tour was disappointing as they just wanted you to get to the tasting room and then get out. We checked out of our hotel and proceeded to get slightly lost trying to find our hotel near the airport. The Holiday  Inn Express was the only brand name hotel we stayed at on this entire trip was by far the worst as there was no airport shuttle or any restaurants nearby and about a 1 mile walk to the train station through a business park. This was only negative experience we have had during this trip.

 Next we’re off to London for the last few days before we wrap up our trip and Blog.