It was a 20 minute train ride to the center of Amsterdam on one of the smoothest train I've ever been on. Everything was in Dutch though so it was a bit of a guessing game as to where we were. Good thing they had tv screens showing the stops coming up next, so it was easier to figure things out than it could have been.
Once off the train, we walked out into Amsterdam and tried to orient ourselves. The Hostel Meeting Point was in a very central location, literally a 5 minute walk from the train station. The street we were staying on was clearly part of a very touristy section.
While we were checking into the hostel Rebecca (Maggie's friend we were meeting and who'd be travelling with us until France) came running out of the bar room and gave Maggie a huge hug. The hostel keeper allowed her to change into the same room with us which was really nice. We went through the loud, dark bar room and made our way up the very steep, narrow stairs to our room, number 5.
Since we chose the cheapest option, it was a 12 bed room... and there were already quite a few people there. We found our beds and looked around for the locker our key was made for. Taking a glance around the room it was clear that we were not looking for any ordinary locker, but that the large metal trash bins scattered around the room was in fact our locker. There was a massive padlock with a chain on the lid on each barrel. This was different. We shoved our three backpacks into the barrel and chained it up. I was ready for dinner.
Back outside we walked up and down the street our hostel was located on but found nothing remotely appetizing. Being picky was not really helping us at this point. We were starving and hadn't properly eaten anything since our Subway sandwiches early that morning. We were advised by our hostel keeper to not eat anything on this street so we moved a few streets over to look for dinner.
Dinner came in an Italian restaurant. It was a last resort. We were starving, the prices weren't terrible, and it was after 10 at that point. It wasn't the greatest food i must say and we didn't realize they charged for the bread and water. But it was food none the less and I went back to the hostel quite satisfied.
The night was a long one, between some guy snoring like crazy and the bed being a little less than comfy. But eventually I managed to fall asleep.
We were woken up by one of our roommates talking really loudly to his friends. Thank god they were packing their things up getting ready to leave for the day. But first of course they had to smoke in the room before they left... it's Amsterdam remember.
We headed out in search of the Anne Frank house.Until I looked a few things up on Amsterdam after we planned our trip, I never knew the Anne Frank house was here. I guess I never really thought about where it was but I imagined it to be in Germany or Poland or something. It took me by even more surprise when we found it and it was kind of a boring modern looking building by the side of a canal. I'm not sure if it really looked like that or if it was fixed up to fit the museum or not but I was a little less than impressed. The line was so long we didn't have time to wait in line so we moved on. I'm sure if we went in I would have a different impression of the house, but it was honestly really disappointing to me. It was nothing what I imagined it would look like and I was actually okay with not waiting in that line to go inside.
We spent a good portion of the day wandering the city and walking along the canals. I love the character of the canal houses. They are so tall and narrow most of them seemed to have been leaning at odd angles too. It's a peaceful city to walk around in when you're away from the main tourist streets.
I was recommended to look around for canal boat tours so we did just that. We climbed aboard one of the canal boats and set off on our hour tour of Amsterdam, canal perspective.
The view of the city from the water was definitely different. I loved the view of these tall canal houses standing so close to the edge of the water. It was on this tour that I learned why the houses are so skinny. In the olden days, a house was taxed by its width, so in order to avoid high taxes the houses were built taller rather than wider. As a result, the front doors were too narrow to fit any furniture through them. The furniture had to be lifted up to the windows by a pulley system attached to the top of the house. As were meandered along I realized all these houses still had the pulley system set up! To help the process it was common for the houses to be built titled toward the street a bit to lift big items. So the leaning houses were purposely built like that, I was beginning to suspect the builders to be drunk or something!
It was around this time that we discovered the Stroopwaffles. These are little wafer like sandwich cookies filled with a delicious gooey cream which I think is known as Stroop. It was incredibly addicting and we all ended up getting more bags of these delicious little things to attempt to bring home with us.
The rest of the night was spent wandering the red light district and many of the streets nearby our hostel. To be honest, I was not a huge fan of Amsterdam. I really liked the areas around the Anne Frank house and places that weren't completely swamped with tourists. But the streets were walked down after dinner really turned me off from Amsterdam. I was a bit taken a back my the thick pungent smell of weed that lurked on every street. And maybe it's just the American in me, but I felt slightly uncomfortable walking by so many sex shops and red light strippers/ prostitutes. Amsterdam is definitely much more comfortable with things like that than I'm used to. I think it was all a little too overwhelming for me. I'd love to visit other places in the Netherlands though, because I know they aren't all like Amsterdam... at least I hope not.
I was looking forward to Brussels the next day. I would finally be able to leave the hostel we were in, which was starting to bring down my travelling spirits. I was looking forward to being in a place where I wouldn't have to feel like I needed a shower every hour. Belgium intrigued me a lot though, I knew nothing about it at this point and didn't really have any expectations for it at all.
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