We made it! Jaclyn and I landed an hour early in Amsterdam after a usual flight filled with bad airplane food and minimal inches of legroom, but who cares - we're in Europe! Looking nothing less than your typical American tourists, we purchased a more legitimate map and decided to tour the main city on our own before we could check in to our hotel. Dutch is an interesting language to say the least but after butchering a few words we were able to find our way to an active part of the city: Leidseplein. The canals are beautiful and Amsterdam has proven to be fascinating so far. The most interesting part is the fact that pedestrians hardly ever have the right of way. Texting while walking is VERY dangerous because if you are not looking up, it is very possible to be in way of either bikers, trams, or cars. Unlike NYC, people don't anticipate the split second they have to 'go for it' and cross the street, people are cautious of which vehicles have the right of way.
In reference to my earlier blog post, I did see the beerbike live in action. From a mile away you can hear loud cheering and soon you see the bike approaching with smiling people happy for attention. I turned to take a picture and they cheered and waved like I was their biggest fan (maybe I was...)
There is lots of shopping! We walked around a main shopping area crowded with people and the Dutch originated company, H&M, popped up every fourth of a mile.
We fly to Genoa tomorrow night for a two week adventure in Italy with some of Jaclyn's family, so this has been such a teaser of Amsterdam. So as my post title, we say "hallo" and goodbye pretty fast, but we'll have plenty of time to continue exploring when we return! For a closing photo, here's a picture of your typical canal.
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