Going Dutch.

This post is dedicated to Michelle and Peter
(in alphabetical order),

who are practically Dutch.

We spent two days hanging out in the weed capital of the universe. I was tempted to go into one of the ubiquitous “coffeeshops” for some hot cocoa, but Tim laughed and told me that “coffeeshops” in Amsterdam have little to nothing to do with warm beverages. We toured the Anne Frank museum and saw our favorite Dutch artists on display at the Rijksmuseum, but we mostly loved walking around the surprisingly beautiful city.

I particularly loved three things about Amsterdam: 1) Everybody bikes everywhere, even during blizzards at night (though this does make driving tricky), and the fact that the city has bike lanes down every major thoroughfare.

2) The city is built around a series of canals (dug centuries ago to reclaim land buried by the sea). We (mostly I) couldn’t resist going on a tourist-trap canal cruise to see the city from the water.

3) The architecture – we couldn’t get enough of the beautiful gables, sculptured facades, windows, and door frames.

Also, I really loved that in places in Europe, there is a “big flush” and “little flush” toilet option. It’s so practical.

We dined at an Eetcafe – Squiggles could not decide what to order.

Our trip coincided with Saint Nicholas Day – we saw Santa and Black Peter all around Holland and Belgium.