Dutch Adventures Days 2-4

Day 2

The plan was to start the day early and get to see as much of the 'dam (Amsterdam) as possible... but as you know how things go, it didn't go according to plan. 11.45am and we were still having breakfast and not to mention still waiting for Marvin Thompson who had promised that he was going to turn up at 11am. Turns out, my friend Marven had had an incident with a bird, it's doodoo and his head as he stepped out of his house to come to meet us. So back in the shower he had to go - hence his lateness.

Anyways, come 2pm and we were off. Using the motorway equivalent of Holland, we got on the A4 and we went past "Den Haag" (The Hague), "Leinden", "Haarlem" and finally into "Amsterdam". As most of you guys know, the Dutch drive on the wrong side of the road - the right hand side, so traffic just seemed to be going all over the place. However, you cannot miss their exits with a big "UIT" (out) sign on them. Genius! Using the local knowledge of Marvin and Stellie, we drove around Amsterdam and then into the centre of the 'dam. Things to note:

The student accomodation made entirely out of Container Boxes - they look better than they sound!!
The strange, or shall I call it, unique architecture that the Dutch seem to enjoy/love.
Bicycles - loads and loads and loads of bicycles!!! I had heard that the dutch love their cycles, but I was never prepared for this... seriously this is on another level. There are multi-storey car parks just for cycles!!
The COLD weather!!
Last, but ny no means last, the red _____ district. Now, let me clarify something here... I did not go to this place to sample the local delights, but simply stumbled upon it on our adventures! I had always wondered why such places are call red light _______ - now I know!!!

With our stomachs rumbling away, Marvin led us to a nice Surinamese restaurant in downtown Amsterdam. Trust me, it did not fail me in any way!! God myself some authentic dish and it came onto my table at lightning speed! I have never seen my food served so quick in a restaurant! With that, the food went down quick as well.

This time, the tiredness was kicking in and we had one final stop before home - Thompson aunty's house. What a blessed day and evening it was... Come midnight, we found our way back on the A4 back to Rotterdam and Stellie and Joel fast asleep in the back... I feel soooo tired that I don't think I will be able to finish this blog as I need to ..... (zzzzzzzzz zzzzzzzzzz)

Day 3

9.30am and am still in bed!! I slept too late to be up early today - even though we had agreed that 8.30am we shall all be awake! lol... I forgot to mention something so far... Stellie is an organised woman - she's good in that department! She has my week already planned out and all I need to do is wake up, check the itinerary and see what's cracking!!

Today is Rotterdam Day!! But wait.. there's been a change of plans... Instead, we shall be catching the train to Volendam for a bit of a culture experience. Checking out the Nederlands public transport website, it told us that we were going to take 2hrs 30mins to our destination. Off we went: Walked to Noordehelling Tram station to take the tram to Rotterdam Central. We then asked one of the nice ladies from Nederlands Trains on how to get to Volendum. "No problem", she said "What you need to do is take the train to Amsterdam Sloterdijk, then change to a train going to Hoorn. Then take a bus from there to Volendam. Trusting the lady with the fancy PDA, we go on the train and our journey ended up takin exactly 4 hours!!! Why the woman sent us to Hoorn we have no idea. We had to take a bus from the Hoorn back down to near "Edam" and then take another bus to Volendam. Mmmhhhhh... women!!

Being next to the massive "Markermeer Lake", the town of Volendam was COOOOOLD!!! Thank the Lord I had been advised to wrap up warmly!! There, we did what we needed to do and here's the evidence:

[ see photo below ]

I would like to think that this was one of my most highlighting experiences so far!!

Back in Rotterdam, we swinged by a nice little hidden restaurant called "De smaak van Afrika" (The taste of Afrika). This place was the 'bomb'!! (not in a literal sense). Oh my days!! It took me back. The setting was just too authentic! I felt like I had taken a flight from Rotterdam back to Africa. Now, this place specialises in West and East African food, but it was good. We ordered their house special and it was special indeed. In front of us were a variety of meats and vegetables nicely laid out ready to be eaten with a Dutch pancake.

Rayon Thompson also joined us at the place (late might I add) and we were blessed. The evening was great and the company was just fantastic. I remember having to run to try and catch the tram. I'm tired now and am surprised that I've managed to type this much...

See you tomorrow!

Day 4

Wow, how time flies by when one is most having fun.

Flick, flick, flick through my itinerary and it's a mixed bag today. Plan is that we go to Hotel NY for some drinks and then take a water-taxi to the other side of the river... Then we would visit the Euromast and have some fanstastic bird's-eye view of Rotterdam and hopefully Den Haag as well. After that, some traditional pancakes.

So, to start the day, we needed to do some food shopping. Now, here in Holland they don't have massive super-duppa supermarkets like Asda, Tesco etc... They have more independent supermarkets, where the guy who bakes your bread knows if you came yesterday to buy some of his bread or not... It's nice and cosy and you are not just a number or some consumer. We went to this place called BAS (Bas van der Heijden) and it was delightful. With a full shopping buggy, we took the tram back to the house to unload and be on our way for the rest of the day.

When we came out and were at the Tram station, we had some second thoughts: The weather was COLD. Now, going to Euromast meant that we would be 100m above ground and at that altitude, the wind/cold is chapping!! And also, it was quite becoming foggy, so the views would not have been fantastic. So we did the most wise thing and skipped it. back home we went.

Come 5pm, we left the house to go to the river. Now, we had a 5.45pm reservation in this joint called "De Pannenkoekenboot" translated to "The Pancake Boat". Wow!! Pancakes?? On a boat??? Wicked!!! However, we got behind schedule and we had to rush. Now, let me tell you something: Stellie can WALK!! Oh my days... I had a keep running behind her just to try and keep up. Joel was jogging and I followed suit. Thank the Lord for late starts!! The boat was late. It was meant to have left at 6pm, but by 6.05pm we were still trying to find it on the "ParkHaven" (park harbour). Having run ahead, Stellie found the boat and Joel and myself came trotting behind to just about catch the boat. The boat experience was just marvelous!! Pancakes on the river - prepared right in front of your eyes!!

An hour later, we were back at the "haven". As the place was next to the Euromast, we got inside and just had a quick overview of the place. We took a moment to experience the local park called "Het Park" and met this tiny little dog that was just full of beans (energy peeps, not literal beans!!!) 1.7km later (yes, I measured it on google... bless google!!!) we got the Tram and got home for some nice Dutch tea. Have I mentioned how cold this place is at the moment? Oh yes, I believe I have... just checking thats all!!

Goede nacht (good night) - that's Dutch by the way - in case you have not realised a language theme here... :-)