Amsterdam

Finally done with my European meetings I had a full day today to explore Amsterdam. I started the morning off with a shuttle to the airport and a train from there to the Central Station in downtown Amsterdam. I didn't really have a plan for when I got there, but across the street from the train station was a place advertising 1 hour canal cruises, so I took one. Amsterdam has a lot of canals so we were able to crisscross through the whole city by boat. It was a good introduction to the city.

When I got off the boat I went to a big map outside the train station to figure out what I wanted to do next. As I was looking a guy came up and asked where I was going. Since I didn't know I hesitated to respond.

"The Red Light District eh?" he assumed.

"No, probably the Rembrandt museum." I replied.

"OK great, follow me."

I followed him, though after a couple blocks when we were still walking I knew what was coming. I've had similar experiences where people become your guide involuntarily and then ask for money at the end. I looked for a place to ditch him, but couldn't find anything that wasn't too obvious. Oh well...he did get me to where I wanted to be pretty quickly (which happened to include a walk through the red light district, lol) so I gave him 1.50 euros. He asked for more. I told him no. He left angry. I should have just told him when I figured out what was going on that I wasn't going to give him anything. Oh well.

The museum was pretty cool. It was where Rembrandt used to live so it was not only a gallery with his work, it was a museum of his life. After I finished with the museum I was pretty hungry so I walked down a street that was packed with people and full of different restaurants. I looked hard for a place that offered dutch food but couldn't find anything so I settled with a place selling Argentine food. Surprisingly there were probably more Argentine restaurants than any other kind. This was my lunch:

This is a place that resembled a typical city center...though I'm not sure it was. There were a lot of people.

After walking around for awhile I went to the other side of the city to visit the Anne Frank house. Today happens to be Yom Kippur, and the museum happens to be closed on Yom Kippur so I wasn't able to go inside but the walk across the city was interesting enough that I didn't feel I had wasted time.

Amsterdam is a pretty neat city. The architecture is incredible. I'm glad I spent the day getting to see it, but I don't feel like I ever need to come back. I was satisfied with walking around it all day and seeing what I did. I will put together the video I took when I get home from the trip.

London Day 2 - Mind the Gap Please

After eating breakfast at the hotel this morning I took a bus to the London underground. It is a subway/rail  system that can get you almost anywhere in London you want to go. I took it to a park just outside of Buckingham Palace. Seeing the Palace in the distance I went check it out. There was a huge crowd gathered outside the gates waiting as though a parade were about to begin. I waited with them but had no idea what was going to happen. After about 15 minutes of waiting music began and soon I saw the source to be a marching band. Those doing the marching were the Queen's Guard. I watched the changing of the Guard for awhile, but didn't have a great view from where I was so I didn't stay for too long. It was cool to see though, since I've heard so much about it.

I then took a bus tour of London. There was a tour guide who pointed out all the important landmarks and told of some of the history regarding them. At one point I got off the bus and went on a short boat tour up the River Thames. After the tour I got back on the bus and finished up the bus tour. It was really fun to see so many historical landmarks. After I got off the bus, I walked around for awhile until I came across Hyde Park. It was huge and it was packed with people. It looked like Gas Works park on the 4th of July. I thought something might be going on, but it seems it was just a lot of people deciding to enjoy the warm weather. I spent a lot of time walking through it, but probably didn't make it even half way through. I was getting tired of walking so I went back to the Green Park, next to Buckingham Palace, and ate lunch.

I then took the train and bus back to my hotel room. I didn't plan to sleep but my bed felt so good when I lied down to read that I couldn't keep my eyes open and I fell asleep for a couple hours. Fortunately I woke up before getting too much sleep that I wouldn't be able to get any sleep tonight. I'm hoping to beat Jet Lag by tomorrow.