Amsterdam

It's 420 week! So I decided to write something about Amsterdam.

I have always pictured Amsterdam as a very cool city - with all the parties, smoking with mary jane legally, and wild crowd. So for these, I had been wanting to go to this place. -- I was young. ;) This was last November 2011.

From Frankfurt, we took the train to Amsterdam. You can choose from Thalys, Eurail, ICE, and Bahn.

It's our first euro city where we traveled by ourselves. I mean no tour guides, no relatives, no help at all. So we dragged our 20 kg baggage and heavy laptop backpack on the city's cobblestone roads to find our hotel. Good thing I printed a map! Although, my baggage was screaming "bog, bog, bog. a.hole I'm not made for this!". It's already night when we finally settled in.

Where to stay? We chose the hotel near the train station so we can leave our heavy bags before we tour around. We stayed at Hotel CC. It's not at the center of the red district, but close.

It's accessible to trams, cafes, restaurants. The room was very small, but cozy and modern. We had the awesome view of the canals. The reception staff were polite, friendly, and very helpful. Plus there's sort of a mini maze getting to the room we were in. The standard room costs EUR130+ per night. More Reviews of Hotel CC

First impression of Amsterdam? The hotel, the toilet, the streets, everything smells weed. At first, I was so cool about it. After some days, I realized it’s no longer pleasant if you would smell it day and night. But kinda expected it. We stayed near the red light district. :)

Coffee Shops

Amsterdam is famous for its vibrant and unique nightlife. Amsterdam has many cafes (bars) - bars which sells hundreds of varieties of weed including pre-rolled joints. I was in awe of the selection. There's actually a category of joints - from happy high to crazy high. They sell the pre-rolled joints (tobacco mixed with weed) for as low as 4 euros.

Coffee shops are always in "hot box". Rolling papers are free! :)

Fact: Coffee shops don't sell alcohol. There's a law which dictates shops may only sell either alcohol or cannabis products.

Red Light District

Amsterdam is also popular for its red light district. You will find girls standing behind the red-lit glass doors dressed in lingerie. They look beautiful and sexy to me (Asian standards).

If the curtain is closed, it means customer is "in". Taking pictures is not really advisable. Bad things will happen to your camera. Plus some curses. :)

Alright enough of cafes and red light. Anyway, I found the other side of Amsterdam! Surprisingly, I thought Amsterdam is just for parties, live sex shows, coffee shops.. but big BUT! It’s a beautiful city with all the lights, amazing architecture, museums and lovely canals and bridges.

Let's start with the train station

We went at two museums: Rembrandt and Van Gogh

These are all walkable from our hotel.

Funny thing: We saw a nude woman’s bronze sculpture, and a drunk man was pouring beer all over her body. I have no idea why, maybe giving her a bath. :P

Canals, canals, bridges and bridges

Amsterdam has been called the "Venice of the North"

One thing to be careful of are the bikes. They don’t stop, they will kill you.

Houseboat. Our tour guide said, there are only limited houseboat permits given away. You can only get one when someone sells his slot or if someone's houseboat vanished somewhere. :)

We paid for the hop on hop off tour. Since it was late, we tried the tram.

I love this part of the city

Overall, I had a great time in Amsterdam. I was happy and high of funny adventures and misadventures.

That's a check on my bucket list. :)

PS. The funniest thing, there was a fire alarm at the hotel after midnight. We were shocked and didn't really know what to do. "Should we run, should we pack, should we go outside?" We were panicking!!! I was putting back all my clothes in my bag. Then after few minutes, there was an announcement from the speakers "Please calm down. There is no fire. Somebody has just smoked tremendously in his room."

GREAT! :P