In the city of Amsterdam, you can have a lot of fun ...

A little late but here we are.  We had a fantastic stay in Amsterdam - and extra special thanks to our amazing hostesses (whom we love so dearly and can't wait to see again!).  Not only did our hostess and her daughter open up their home to us but for our first night, they got us a stay in a PIMPIN hotel (Hotel Arena see: http://www.hotelarena.nl/).   Not only was the hotel comfortable and stylish with a delicious breakfast, it's branding was amazing.  The building the hotel is in used to be an orphanage, then it was a hostel (with various artistic performances there, if I remember correctly) and now a hotel.  Associated with the hotel (TOSTAY) is also a large club (TONIGHT), a restaurant (TOEAT) and various meeting rooms for corporate events (TOMEET).   Rooms were fabulous - our had a loft bed and rain shower (which was by the way all in glass that looked onto the living area :).  And we certainly enjoyed the room to the max.  We arrived very early in the morning from the US bleary eyed and very tired (having only napped on our overnight flight).  As the hotel was booked the room wasn't ready yet so we left our packs and went for a walk in the city. The day was absolutely dreadful, worst weather we have encountered yet: dark, windy and pouring rain.  As all the Dutch kept saying "typical Dutch weather".  When we got back to the hotel all wet, tired and cranky, the room with its heavenly rain shower was waiting for us.  And we never left the room again until the next day.  Just perfect :)   Ladies - thank you so much again (dank u wel)!!! 

I know, you're probably thinking, enough already, let me hear a bit about Amsterdam!!!  Well, in a nutshell, it is a beautiful, very livable and very well organized city with friendly, tall and good looking Dutch people.  We could 100% live there.  All the gorgeous canals are lined with tall and not too wide 3-4 story buildings with high windows on the streets and canal boats in the canals (with I think about 400 bridges crossing all the canals).   As the houses are narrow and hence the stairs are quite tight, they all have a hook at the top of the building onto which you attach a long rope to raise furniture or other big pieces into the house through the windows.  Which by the way open ALL THE WAY!  Brilliant! 

A hook at the top of a house

We read that they used to tax you based on the street frontage you had, so residents used to make their houses as narrow and tall as possible.  Check out this one-meter wide house -- narrow street frontage and then it widens in the back to accommodate normal living quarters :)  Pure stroke of genius!!!



the one meter house

And, of course, one couldn't talk about Amsterdam without mentioning all of the bikes ... there are bikes everywhere.  And we mean everywhere.  On a six hour walk through the centrum and south of Amsterdam, we counted every corner and we only found 6 without a bike.  And we don't mean intersections but corners.  Every corner had a bike locked up or just sitting there.  Just amazing and quite brilliant we have to say.  The city is pretty flat so it makes so much sense: it's economical, environmentally sound and very healthy for the population.  No wonder everyone is so tall, lean and healthy.  And everyone bikes, everyone, to go anywhere and everywhere.  That brings us back to our organization comment - the city is sooo well organized.  Every single street has first a path for pedestrians, then a bike path, then a tram or bus line, then one lane for cars, then again, tram/bus, bike, then people.  Just brilliant. You can go anywhere you want by foot, bike or public transport and then if you have to, you can drive.  We absolutely loved it.  Oh and can't forget the roads and sidewalks: they are all so nice and made of stone or cobble stone.  So Euro and very classy. 

parking by central station

So in closing, comparing our first European destination to our last North American one we have come to a few conclusions.  New York is alive and definitely a city that doesn't sleep but it's gritty, dirty, and busy with dirty buildings and their exterior fire escapes (which ruin the aperance of building just a tad) and entrances to basements.  Amsterdam on the other hand was fresh, organized and clean with a noticable pride of ownership.  All of the buildings looked freshly painted or stained in colours that were vibrant but classy.  The roads were organized and well maintained and who can forget the bikes.  Lastly, the people were frendly and 99% of them spoke perfect English (Dank u wel!).   We highly recommend that you visit Amsterdam on any trip to Europe.

Here are a few pictures and to see more, click on this link (password: europa):  http://photobucket.com/SM_Amsterdam2010. 

Talk again soon!

parking in front of Central Station