I am AMESTERdam

Goedenavond!!

I am Amester in Amsterdam

Country one of the trip draws to a close tomorrow so thought I should probably spend the evening updating my blog :) Soo where to start... I have a red face (my nose resembles Rudolph), thanks to the sun on Kings day! My shoulders hurt after about 4 hours of carrying my 8.5kg bag on the first day,and i'm fed up of having to pay to use a toilet!! But other than that I can't complain - free WiFi is super easy to get hold of over here :)

Accommodation's basic but nice - good old bunk beds! Well the top bunk doesn't actually have a side barrier and is rather narrow so my mattress is staying on the floor. It minimises the risk of accident prone Amy rolling over in her sleep and dropping a metre or two! Also for a couple of nights on a trott, drunks have mistaken our door for their's, thank god for locks I'm telling you! Its like being in student halls again in a way.

We visited the Anne Frank house museum on Sunday! We queued for two hours in cold wind but I'm glad we did. If i'm honest I couldn't really remember the story, all I could remember was the bookcase door. Nonetheless I found this experience interesting and definitely thought provoking.

Sunday evening and Monday 27th saw Kings night/day celebrations! Kings day is the kings birthday, with massive celebrations and people wearing orange!  I bought anm orange top andca funky headband to wear :) From what I could gather its a chance for a massive p@#s up and party! Obviously I had to join in so I had a hot chocolate and chips!! In the morning we visited vondekpark where the place was heaving with children selling; old toys, food, drink (non alcoholic), making pancakes, fresh orange juice, performing; circus skills, playing musical instruments, singing, etc. Its quite a sight to see! We listened to a live samba band then sat along the canal for hours watching the hundreds of boats go by blaring music from on board sound systems/DJs.

Big bike advertising the tour de France 201

Traditional Dutch windmill

Today we hopped on a train to the town of Utrecht. Utrecht is the starting point of the tour de France 2015. Here we walked along more canals and saw a tradiational Dutch windmill. The evening has been spent writing our travel journals and updating our blogs. Head over to Jens new blog post here.

Amsterdam's transport system is nuts!! To me it had no logic and its beyond me how I didn't see a crash. It was near impossible to differentiate between what was cycle lanes, pedestrian lanes, car lanes, bus lanes and tram lanes. It appears that trams and cars just fight for the same space.Bikes and motorbikes use the same lane at speed with neither vehicle willing to move out the way. Also I'm pretty sure most roads didn't have designated pedestrian walking areas. It seemed we just had to dodge the bikes and motorbikes. Also when crossing on a green man, it appears vehicles will still use the road regardless. So that's also risky! (This paragraph reminds me of my 3rd year transport assignment on the Brussels transport system, haa)

Enjoy reading!

Goede Nacht

Amester x