Amsterdam

To be honest, it's a little bit strange to be blogging from outside of the context of my IES program in Italy, but I do want to see the blog through to the end of my Europe adventures. It's been a really good way to keep track of the things that I've done, and gives me an excuse to look through my pictures to pick out some of my favorites.

So...Amsterdam. I had two days to chill in Brussels before meeting up with Hannah in Amsterdam. I literally did nothing and it was glorious and entirely necessary. Monday morning, I had to get up super early to hop on the bus to Amsterdam. Hannah turned out to be on the same bus, coming from London, which was super perfect, so we didn't have to worry about finding each other once we got there.

When we arrived in Amsterdam, we wandered around for a while, generally looking for the hostel but not too worried about getting there as fast as possible. I was a little concerned about what kind of hostel we would find; the ratings weren't fabulous and we were staying in a dorm with 14 beds but it turned out to be totally fine, and in a really central location that was perfect for all of the adventures.

Our first priority was food. We found pancakes. They were awesome.

That afternoon, we walked around and snapped some photos of the area. Amsterdam really is beautiful, and very different from the other cities that I've visited.

In the afternoon, we went to the House of Bols, which was a "museum" about Bols, a kind of liquor created by Mr. Bols in Amsterdam. It was interesting, and we got a chance to smell a ton of flavors and try to guess what they were...neither of us were very good at it.

At the end, we got to sample a drink and a few flavors of the many many kinds of liquor.

The white one was a yogurt flavored liquor. We didn't like it very much but it was fun to try.

The rest of the day was spent wandering around and just enjoying how interesting the city is. 

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Tuesday morning we started out bright and early with the Anne Frank museum. While it wasn't the most cheerful start to the day, it was extremely interesting and definitely not something I would want to miss.

Afterwards, we did more walking around. I guess what our Amsterdam time boiled down to was a lot of wandering around, but I really think I got an interesting view of the culture of the city. We saw the red light district, both during day and at night and met interesting people at the hostel, with interesting perspectives on the city of Amsterdam. 

I think I got a good taste of what it is like there, and while there is a lot about the city that is maybe not so bright and shiny, I really liked the city.