I’ll skip through the first parts really quickly, strap yourself in, here we go!
Arrive at Amsterdam airport, through security, find the free shuttle bus to the hotel (6 mins from the airport), and drop off bags at the hotel. We knew the room wouldn’t be ready so early. While we were waiting for the bus back to the airport, we grabbed a coffee in the hotel lounge (the bus runs every 15 minutes – resulting in a 30-minute loop). The train to Amsterdam took 15 minutes, which was amazing. Much easier than visiting London. We paused at the supermarket to grab a drink, before starting our 12-mile walk around the city.

One of the first things we did was find Anne Frank’s house. Unfortunately, we couldn’t go inside because the tickets were booked up very quickly. Despite this, it was really strange standing outside the house where she hid writing what she assumed would be inconsequential accounts of her story. It wasn’t too difficult for me to imagine the brutality of those times with people in constant fear as the swarms of German troops scoured the city for anyone who might be violating their self-imposed regime. We are so thankful we’ve not had to live through anything like that or be forced to hide in constant fear of being discovered and imprisoned or worse.

I’m not about to give a detailed description of all the things we saw, but here are a few highlights.
Amsterdam has a lot of canals, and therefore a lot of bridges. Mix this with the blend of old cobbled streets, a mixture of narrow one-way and more modern two-way roads, unlimited cycle lanes and an extensive tram network; all resulting in a need to constantly be alert. No wondering aimlessly around. Easy right? Not really. A pedestrian area subtly ends and suddenly you find yourself crossing tram tracks, or my personal favorite, a cobbled footpath meeting a road crossroads where the cars drive over the footpath. (What?) Yep, you read that right, the cars drive over the footpath. There are even little ramps on each side of the path to ensure they don’t need to bump up and down the curb.
We bought lunch from a grab-and-go panini shack. And then stopped at a coffee house to get out of the chilly wind, take the weight off our feet, and use their facilities.
Liz had tea, Char had her usual, and I had mint, ginger and lime tea. As a sweet treat with the drinks, they provided a small chocolate, about the size of a chocolate coin, some had a flavour in the chocolate. Mine was nougat, Liz had hazelnut and Char had dark milk. Amazingly, Liz preferred the nougat one, despite hating the classic pink and white nougat bars. My tea was a bit off the wall being two large slices of ginger, a couple of wedges of lime and a handful of mint in a glass mug of hot water. All I needed was a little ice and anyone observing us would think I was consuming a Mojito.
The Heineken Experience was very interesting, even though I’m not a larger fan at all it was great to learn more bout the process of beer making. One interesting thing was being up close to the giant copper tanks where they used to create the ase liquid for the lager before they moved production outside the city center to a bigger plant.

We strolled around a few more streets on our way back to the station. I wanted to try a Dutch pancake, so I persuaded the ladies to follow me into a pancake shop.
Recalling our American experiences with pancakes, we decided to share one – which as it turned out was a shrewd move.

We chatted about the restaurants we’d seen and decided we didn’t fancy the Dutch ones which we very meaty, and predominantly stewed meats in veal gravy. So we opted for an Italian. When you’re searching for somewhere to eat, very often you think there might be somewhere better around the next corner. And so we strolled on, and away from the high-price restaurants. With a less glitzy exterior but better better-priced menu, we spotted an Italian restaurant nestled between a bakery and a trinket shop. At first, we walked past, but then we thought “It’s the best-priced one we; ‘ve seen and it looks to be full of students, why not give it a try?” It’s often a good rule to eat where the locals do!” The ladies had a pizza each and I tucked into a house-special pasta bake and side salad.

From there, back to Amsterdam Central Station, which much like Kings Cross Station looks like a palace from the outside., and then back to the hotel.
Good night!