Last night was a short night, but we bid Ireland good-bye and were with our packs on our backs heading to the airport bright and early! Must be our age, but it felt good to be there with plenty of time to spare and not have to worry about getting there on time. Much less stressful.
We arrive in Amsterdam and once again, everything is new and different and once again, we are stupid and don't know how to do anything! We can't read any signs, but must figure out how to buy train tickets to city center, which train, when to get off, which street car to take to our hotel, and on and on. Again, stressful, but we feel really good when we get it all accomplished and we do arrive at our hotel, which is really more like a bed and breakfast run by Mary DeVries and her daughter, Hanneke. Our room, up a small spiral staircase, is bright, and delightful, over-looking the garden in the back. It is quite a large room with an ancient fireplace. Hanneke gives us good advice on what to do tonight and we set out for a drink and a little something to eat. We walk to the flower market, take a canal cruise and end up having a traditional Dutch dinner of sausage, meatball and bacon served with mashed potatoes mixed with mashed vegetables or sauerkraut with, of course, beer--Heineken now instead of Guinness.
One has to be very careful in Amsterdam. There are a million bicycles going everywhere. So you have to watch out for bikes, scooters, cars, and streetcars as well as uneven cobblestones and doggy poop! We'll be lucky to survive Amsterdam! As great as Ireland was, it is exciting to be in a new country, where we've never been!
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