Travelling to Amsterdam

We checked out of our hotel early this morning, anxious to get a taxi to get us through the morning rush hour to the Gare du Nord to catch our high speed Thalys train to Amsterdam. As it was, we got there more than 2 hours ahead of time, and used the time to read what Rick Steves had to say about Amsterdam.

The train left on time at 10:25 am and travels at 300 km per hour. We travelled through Brussels, Antwerp, Rotterdam and then arrived in Amsterdam.

The scenery on the journey consisted of flat, open countryside, farmland with small villages, wind farms, and the building style changed very quickly from the French style, to a Dutch style. Unfortunately, the weather had deteriorated to rain.

















We travelled First Class, which meant we had nice seats with a table for our group of 4, free wi-fi, and a lovely meal, most of which I guessed I could eat - minus the bread and the pasta. I made up for that by having 2 of the small bottles of Chardonnay! It didn't take long to have an effect though, and by the time we had to get off the train I was laughing and giggling and barely able to see what was going on around me! Drunk in charge of a suitcase! The walk in the rain along the main street to our hotel, the footpath teaming with people as well as the rain, soon sobered me up though - luckily Steve led the way, as I was incapable! Thank goodness our hotel was so close, along the main street - the Hotel Roode Leeuw.

We had a short rest, we had a quick look around the area near the hotel, then headed back along the road to take a look at the Sex Museum. I won't post the picture I took in there! Very interesting though! Then back to the hotel to change for dinner which we had in the hotel's brasserie, looking out onto the crowded street. We even saw one girl collapse directly in front of us as she was trying to get on the tram with a friend - her legs turned to rubber and down she went, banging her head. David thinks she must have been having marijuana or something and overdone things. Anyway, we had a set menu of 3 courses for 29.95 Euros each and all agreed it was the best meal we had had so far on the trip. They didn't bat an eyelid when I asked for gluten free and my meal included everything it was meant to except some bread.

After dinner we went for a walk around the (in)famous red light district. I wasn't brave enough to take photos of any of the ladies standing in the windows (and found out later that this would have been frowned upon anyway). Jan and I did wonder where the windows with men were! The streets were crowded with people, all gawking like us. Steve had a 50 Euro note in his pocket, but didn't get around to spending it :-)