Dutch bikes

Parting kudos. The Dutch have an uncanny ability to make the impractical seem so practical - at least when it comes to bikes.

Bikes for one person:

(The bike I rented)

Bikes for 2 people:

Bikes for 3 people:

Bikes for 3+ people:

And they make it look so easy:

Amsterdam - day 5

We flight out of Amsterdam left at 2:25PM. That gave us time to pack, grab breakfast, and take one last stroll around town. 

Here are a few parting shots of our apartment:

And of our famous neighbor:

After breakfast, Pete found us and said he found the floating flower market:

They sell some interesting starter kits. Unfortunately, nothing they sold could be brought back to American soil:

We flew over Canada on the way home. It looked colder than Amsterdam:

Amsterdam - day 4

Monday was our last full day in Amsterdam, and we made the most of it.

While Pete went out in search of fresh bread, Glenn and I found a small diner to have a quick breakfast:


Next up, we headed to the Anne Frank Museum. As you'd expect, it's a humbling place:



The day looked nice, so we decided to rent bikes to explore the city. However, we had to first find a bike rental place. While searching, we passed some frozen canals - which I understand is not that common in the city - which also explains all the excitement of the skaters:




We passed another open market with vendors selling typical local fare - like egg rolls:


We finally found a shop that rented typical Dutch bikes. By typical, I mean steel city bikes - nothing fancy - no carbon, no titanium, not even aluminum:



We made our way through the city and to Vondelpark, Amsterdam's central park:




Leaving the park, we stopped by an Italian cafe for a spot of coffee (real coffee) and met a local tradesman who is in the home construction industry. I was struck by how well and world informed all the people we had met had been. They knew about our government, our primary races, and our financial landscape. And this guy had a cool dog to boot:


After 3 hours of biking, we turned in our bikes and headed to our last pub - In de Wildeman ("In the Wild Man"), where we ran into a couple from the UK that we had met earlier in our trip:



The bartender was friendly and knowledgeable about beer:


But the craziest thing was running into 2 other people at the bar who grew up in Austin - a tech guy (now living in Phoenix) and a real estate agent (now living in Amsterdam):

Amsterdam - day 3 - Antwerp

After wrapping up with the brewery tour at La Trappe, Pete suggested we have dinner in Belgium. We were already near the Belgium border, and the train ride to Antwerp would take less than an hour. Given the train schedules, we would only be able to spend a few hours in Antwerp, but we decided to go for it.

We arrived in Antwerp a little after 6:PM. Their central train station had the same vibe as the one in Amsterdam:


However, there were certainly less bicyclists out than in Amsterdam. Although, bikes were for rent as soon as you left the train station:


We headed out looking for an interesting dinner spot. We passed a chocolate shop and thought it would be wrong to not buy Belgian chocolates in Belgium:


We headed through downtown:



past the Cathedral of Our Lady:




and towards the Scheldt river and the harbor:



The medieval Het Steen (Stone Castle) is situated on the river and has a large statue of the giant Lange Wapper at the entrance:




We did finally find a place to eat dinner. It was a mediocre Argentinian restaurant, food-wise, but the furnishings were amusing. And the owner had a fascination with Che Guevara:


We rushed back to Antwerp Station after dinner, so as to not miss our 9:PM train. However, that train back to Amsterdam had been cancelled. We had an hour to wait around the station, so Pete went out exploring, while Glenn and I hung out at their heated Starbucks. By this point, we were both pretty cold and tired.

But hey, the station has these cool stone rails to haul bikes up and down on: