Amsterdam, Holland

On Friday afternoon, Christian called me to say his soccer game was cancelled for Saturday afternoon and how would I like to go to Amsterdam for the weekend. Of course I would!!! So Saturday morning we packed up our car and a little over 2 hours later, we were in Amsterdam. We booked a room at the Park Hotel http://www.parkhotel.nl/ in downtown Amsterdam. It was a fantastic hotel that we would highly suggest staying at. Just make sure you ask for a room that is not right above a bar - they party until 4:30am!!! Our first order of business was to grab some lunch, so headed across the street to the Hard Rock Cafe Amsterdam. Since I have been pregnant, I have been craving bacon and I can't find bacon anywhere here in Brussels and I knew they would have some there. So what did I order, yep, you guessed it, a Bacon Chesseburger w/fries. It was one of the best things...a burger and bacon! Love it. Christian went with another favorite classic, the Club Sandwich. fter stuffing our faces it was off to see the city. We had no plan, just a map and all day to explore. The first thing we came across that blew us away were the amount of bikes in Amsterdam. After looking at the map, we decided it was very important to go take the Ann Frank House Tour. We waited in line for about 30 minutes before going in and it was well worth it. I think I read Ann's diary back in Middle school and going through each room in the house made everything just come to life. It was an amazing experience for both of us. Next it was off to the flower market to see Holland's famous flower, the tulip. The flowers there were so beautiful, if only I could buy some of the bulbs to take back to the US with me.

They also sell other things at the flower market; the picture speaks for itself.

The rest of the day was just spent walking around, enjoying the scenery, all of the beautiful canals and literally trying not to get high as we walked past the coffee shops.

That night we stumbled upon a fantastic little Italian restaurant where we had some great food and a nice chat together. After dinner we headed down to the Red Light District to see what all the hype was about. All I'm going to say is, whatever you have heard or read about the district...it is probably true. Oh my!!

The next morning we had a nice English Breakfast at a cute cafe and then off to the Van Gogh Museum to see the famous paintings. The paintings were amazing to see and to learn about his life was was even better.

We ended our Amsterdam trip by walking past a English/British store. Our eyes lite up like Christmas trees and we ran into the store just in awe of what we were looking at. We bought a few things, like Cheerios, Campbells Cream of Mushroom Soup, Pancake Mix & microwave popcorn. We were so excited, until she told us the bill, I almost chocked on my gum but like Christian said it would have probably cost that much if we had someone ship that stuff over to us. Anyways, we are enjoying the food.

We would highly suggest putting Amsterdam on your places to visit list. We had a fantastic time and we hope to make it back there again.

C & M