Amsterdam ... Day Two

How can you not wake up happy in Amsterdam?  The weather was cold, but rather clear, which was nice.  The wind was the worst there.  After bundling up, we ventured out that morning to find a good place to grab something for breakfast.  We ventured by a few places the night before and spotted a few stores that looked good, so we headed in that direction.  We found a little local shop that had a ton of pastries in the window, so we went in.

We failed in learning hello in Dutch before we got there.  We did our best to order with out being those incompetent Americans.  Sadly, the only thing the bakery didn't have was coffee.  We found a little cafe and both got latte's to go.

We stumbled upon a park and sat on a bench and enjoyed our first breakfast together.

The park itself was quite funny, no grass, just bricks.  There was this adorable house nearby that was beautiful.  I had to take a picture.  Don't you love the green roof?

After our quick breakfast, we were off to see our first museum, the Rijksmuseum.  The streets there were filled with bikes.  No one really drives there or at least in the area we were at.  No matter how cold, you'd see everyone riding around on their black bike.



Sadly, only a third of the museum was actually open, but it did still showcase some amazing paintings that I studied in college. The outside of the building was getting a facelift as well, but it was still so beautiful and such a huge building.

This piece below was in a hallway, and I didn't really notice it the first time I walked by.  It's an installation piece where a man filmed himself changing the arms of the clock every minute.

Here are some of my pieces from the museum that were my favorite:

Winter landscape with skaters
By Hendrick Avercamp
The thing I remembered about this one was that there is a guy in the middle left that is peeing on a tree.  Interesting fact right?

Still Life with tall Glass Beer
By Jan Jansz van de Velde
D really liked this one, because the tall beer glass is actually a game.  The card read - The most striking object in this painting is the tall pasglas, a special beer glass which was part of a drinking game popular in the 17th century.  When it was your turn, you had a drink just to the next ring - no simple task for someone who had already had a few.  If you missed that ring, you had to keep going until you hit the next one.

Young, Self Portrait
By Rembrandt

Etchings
By Rembrandt


The Night Watch
By Rembrandt
This painting is HUGE.  It's figures are larger than D is.  This piece was actually cropped quite a bit from it's original canvas to fit.

When we were almost all the way through the museum, I started to feel a little off.  I tried to shake it off, but after a few more minutes I really thought I was going to pass out.  The whole damp palms, blood draining from you face = not good.  Luckily, in most museums there are seats so you can enjoy the art.  After a few minutes and D massaging my back, I felt a little better.  Trying not to be dramatic, I tried to go through the rest of the museum.  I didn't want to miss some of the most famous pieces, especially the one above.  We made it through, but decided to go back to the hotel, ingest some water and relax for a bit.

I still blame it on a combination of the travels and that darn meat tray from the bar.  I didn't want to lay around all day, so we eventually continued on our day.  I made the mistake of only bringing Advil PM instead of regular Advil, that sure would have helped that day.

The walk around is just so gorgeous.  We made our way to the outdoor flower market called Bloemenmarkt.  Since the tulips really are not quite in season, there was only one area at the end with cut flowers. 

Of course the bulbs were huge, if only we could have taken those back to the States.

D had found this little corner Cafe for lunch that day.  The seating area was so small and compact, but we got a window seat. D ordered a roast beef sandwich and I ordered the pesto, mozzarella and tomato sandwich.

I also got to spend my first Euro to use the bathroom.  Most places there had a public bathroom, but when you are shopping or walking around, they are a little harder to find for free.  Needless to say, it was a really nice bathroom.  Super clean and the seats even had the plastic on the rim that you turn to have it replaced with a new one.  Fancy.

We walked back to one of the spot D wanted to try for beers called T'arendsnest at about 4 that afternoon.

We really enjoyed the bar, but it was definitely a tourist spot.  We sat at the bar and were one of the first people there that afternoon.  We tried all sorts of beer, they were SO good.  By our third beer, we were chatting it up with the bartender and getting the scoop about the bar.  They definitely attract tourists and we were intrigued to hear where he was from and how well he spoke English.  He said he speaks more English there than Dutch, even growing up they are exposed to a ton of English since all their music and TV were in English.   I love sitting at the bar, you just get to meet so many more people this way.

Shortly after we arrived a couple sat next to us and we started chatting.  They were from Seattle.  They traveled to London for a week and then came to Amsterdam for a few days.  They were adorable.  We chatted with them for probably two hours before we decided we should really find some dinner.

We ventured around a bit and also used Trip Advisor to find some good places to eat.  We ended up at a little restaurant called l'express.   We of course hadn't had enough at that point, and I enjoyed some red wine while D had more beer.  I got the tortellini with Spanish and cream fromage sauce.  D went for the full course meal with a starter of buttered shrimp, followed by the steak with salad and delicious potatoes and a tasty dipping sauce.  He loved the hash/potatoes on his steak plate.  No European dinner is complete with out dessert.  We ended with ice cream and chocolate sauce - yum!

The best part about vacation is that you can really just indulge and enjoy each other.  An adorable bar that we had seen the previous night was a little less crowded that night and showing a football game, so we stopped in and had a few more drinks.  I found it interesting that all the bathrooms are always in the basement.  You always have some super steep spiral staircase to climb down.  Drunk Europeans must be much more coordinated than Americans. 

You would have thought I would have went home and passed out after all that drinking, but my body had a different idea in mind.  I was up most of the night, just laying there.  I thought about taking an Advil PM, but didn't want to feel sleepy the next morning.  Let's just say that I got a lot of emails taken care of that night.