Jill usually goes to the AWP conference this time of the year. But this year she wanted to take a break, so we went East to visit her publisher friend in the DC area.
Here we are about to leave Austin:
Reb, Chris and Gideon live on a picturesque wooded lot in Reston. Gideon is Jill's godson:
Jill has a childhood fascination with Montichello, so Chris rented a minivan, and we made the 2 hour pilgrimage to Charlottsville. The grounds were beautiful:
I learned a few things along the tour. For instance, the African workers are called 'enslaved people' by the tour guides; Jeffereson died deeply in debt (a million dollars by today's standards); and he only freed 5 slaves in his will.
We also had a chance to visit the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum's annex at Washington Dulles International Airport. Growing up, I had a fascination with WW II airplanes. The Udvar-Hazy Center allowed me to geek out a bit in that regard. Some of the more interesting displays include:
All, in all, it was a really nice trip with really good people. It was relaxing, we ate a bunch of good food, and drank some nice spirits.
And then we flew home:
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:
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:
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):
