The European Adventure: Amsterdam

After three lovely days in Brussels, we took a twoish hour train ride to meet M in Amsterdam for our conference. Amsterdam was a lovely city, so beautiful. I am not sure my pictures do it justice.

The pictures to try....

More cheese - here its Gouda and its goooda - couldn't help myself (so cheesy). Ha! Couldn't help myself again :) We weren't allowed to take any back to the US though. So sad.

Amsterdam has more bikes than people, and they have lanes and signals for cars, bikes, and pedestrians. M was almost taken out and almost took out someone on a bike. 

A great deal of Amsterdam is built on reclaimed marsh, and it is below sea level. Because of this, there is a lot of shifting and the buildings are all leaning at odd angles.

 One of the lovely canals at night.

 This is the Royal Palace in Amsterdam, if you look closely, there are Unicorns with gold horns...

Can you see them?

The flower market...

When in Amsterdam, you have to do the Heineken tour! We learned a great deal about them and their marketing. Our consensus is that Heineken tastes much better in Holland.

 Scenes from our canal tour...

 Beautiful houseboats everywhere...

Bicycles and canals...

This is the Cafe de Sluyswacht, which is leaning over because it is all by itself with no other buildings helping it stand up straight. It was built in 1695!!

We did visit Anne Frank's museum, where she hid with her family and another for almost two years during WWII. I never read the book, so I did before I visited - finished it Singapore. This was a super moving visit for me - I fought back tears the whole time (even though I never cry- haha). We weren't allowed to take pictures inside, but here is a statue from outside.