Georges birthday weekend in Amsterdam
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| chocomel to the rescue |
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| funniest thing, i just about died laughing |
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| two smoothies please, im feeling extra seedy at van gogh museum |
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| kate thoroughly enjoying my company |
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| george looking wistful...just found a place that does bloody mary fiiinally |
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| i can see your a first time flyer... |
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| sisssstaaaas are doin it |
To celebrate my friend Georges birthday a few weeks ago, she arranged a wee trip to Amsterdam! George and I caught the Eurostar over, while her friend Nicola caught the train from France and our friend Kate flew over from London. From the get go we were disorganised as hell, with both me and George being late to the train (still made it obvs) and Georges phone going flat, but luckily we bumped into each other walking around St Pancras station haha.
I love train rides, I dunno, I think it might be my favourite way to travel. Not the tube or anything, because screw that. But long train rides are ok by me. We found our seats and then a group of 6 American teenage boys sat down beside us. Hooray. One of them happened to have my current favourite snack of all time with them - Combos, a pretzel filled with cheese, oh yes oh yes - so I guess I'll eat my sarcasm right up, they were quite nice and shared them mmmmhmmm.
After a stop off in Brussels, George and I had separate seats that couldn't be changed, so we split up and as I was walking towards the only free seat in the carriage that was mine, and who am I sitting beside?? The same American boy from the first train. What are the odds. Was pretty good I didn't have to make small talk with anyone new - Alana's worst nightmare - and after about 20 minutes George and I went up to the food car and stayed there for the rest of the time anyway. And then we were in Amsterdam!
As soon as you get out of the main train station it's pretty as. A massive 3 storey bike garage absolutely PACKED with bikes. Bikes bikes and more bikes, which I'd heard from others it was pretty bike heavy, but whoa, there are hundreds everywhere. Me and George decided we would find a wee bar and have a beer while we waited for Nicola, who was coming in an hour later to the same station. A beer and some hilaaaaarious postcards later, we were off to the >Stayok Vondelpark< hostel, on a tram, which by the way they have a little ticket booth man on every one except the 5. The hostel had (annoyingly) split us up into two groups, which was going to prove an even bigger bugger than it sounds as I had to leave a day earlier than the others.
The first night we headed out to find some tradish foods and a place to drink...which ended up being a wee piano bar, where the ladies piano was actually a bar you could sit at, which seems too close for my comfort zone, so we picked a booth thing and sat down for 'a few quiets'. Cue rawkus amounts of table-serviced alcohol. Table service in a bar, who woulda thunk it...also when it hit midnight everyone in the bar started smoking, another weird law. The next day consisted of trying to find somewhere that had tomato juice so we could get ourselves a bloody mary breakfast, snacking on the bitterballen goodness, and wandering the streets ogling the stuffs. We found our way to a market which was quite cool, wandered down countless canal as you do, then just as a mighty rain storm hit, found a wee pub to chill at for a couple beers. I might add, that none of our team are in to smoking weed, hence no mention of coffee shops etc.
Whilst sitting under an umbrella at this pub, George discovers DJ Shadow is playing right across the canal from our hostel. Wicked. We head home for a nap, get up for some dinner, and in the square too oo how tourist. Then down to DJ Shadow for the night. Awesome.
The last day for me, Kate and I couldn't get hold of the others so we headed out to the Van Gogh museum round the corner, checked out the 'Iamsterdam' sign and waited for the others. After burgers and people watching, we went to check out the red light district, where we parked up watching a 3D printer making a wee man, and also chuckling at the guys coming out and going in, and also a dad buy his son a prossy, I'm assuming for his birthday or whatever. WEIRD KTHANXBAIDAD. Anyway. More sightseeing and beer drinking and finally we sit down to some snackacious dinner time when I discover it's time for me to go. I was flying back a day early as I couldn't get the extra day off work, so I left the others for a hilarious plane ride with some people who had obviously over-indulged in probably everything Amsterdam has to offer. Frothing at the mouth, red eyes, talking nonsense. The poor guys friend (thank god) asked if we could switch seats to take care of the friend. I (obviously) didn't get the camera out too much this trip???? Ah well. It was fun! Thanks George!
The first night we headed out to find some tradish foods and a place to drink...which ended up being a wee piano bar, where the ladies piano was actually a bar you could sit at, which seems too close for my comfort zone, so we picked a booth thing and sat down for 'a few quiets'. Cue rawkus amounts of table-serviced alcohol. Table service in a bar, who woulda thunk it...also when it hit midnight everyone in the bar started smoking, another weird law. The next day consisted of trying to find somewhere that had tomato juice so we could get ourselves a bloody mary breakfast, snacking on the bitterballen goodness, and wandering the streets ogling the stuffs. We found our way to a market which was quite cool, wandered down countless canal as you do, then just as a mighty rain storm hit, found a wee pub to chill at for a couple beers. I might add, that none of our team are in to smoking weed, hence no mention of coffee shops etc.
Whilst sitting under an umbrella at this pub, George discovers DJ Shadow is playing right across the canal from our hostel. Wicked. We head home for a nap, get up for some dinner, and in the square too oo how tourist. Then down to DJ Shadow for the night. Awesome.
The last day for me, Kate and I couldn't get hold of the others so we headed out to the Van Gogh museum round the corner, checked out the 'Iamsterdam' sign and waited for the others. After burgers and people watching, we went to check out the red light district, where we parked up watching a 3D printer making a wee man, and also chuckling at the guys coming out and going in, and also a dad buy his son a prossy, I'm assuming for his birthday or whatever. WEIRD KTHANXBAIDAD. Anyway. More sightseeing and beer drinking and finally we sit down to some snackacious dinner time when I discover it's time for me to go. I was flying back a day early as I couldn't get the extra day off work, so I left the others for a hilarious plane ride with some people who had obviously over-indulged in probably everything Amsterdam has to offer. Frothing at the mouth, red eyes, talking nonsense. The poor guys friend (thank god) asked if we could switch seats to take care of the friend. I (obviously) didn't get the camera out too much this trip???? Ah well. It was fun! Thanks George!
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