Yesterday we woke up early and were on a 4:00 bus to the airport for our flight to Amsterdam. Our flight to Amsterdam was quick and easy. I was in between two young students too that were also traveling!

We arrived in Eindhoven in the late morning and then activated our EuRails and took our first European train to Amsterdam! It was so nice.

We arrived to our hostel, The Flying Pig, and were a little shocked to say the least! This was our first hostel experience and being thrown into a 32 bed dorm was a little different... The hostel is famous, spotless and well recommended. We locked up our bags and off we went!

Amsterdam is a beautiful city that is on canals with many bridges, bikes, old buildings, coffee shops, designer stores and historic museums. It's probably the only place where people have to walk on the streets because so many bikes are chained to the sidewalks. It's so sdorable especially with the canals, boats and boat houses that are in the background.

The canals made the city a little
difficult to navigate, but we had our trusty 50 page itinerary with maps, names, directions and phone numbers to help us out! I'm learning how to read a map better each day!

Our first stop after a very early morning and two hour train ride we grabbed lunch at a canal side cafe and got paninis. I think we may have said "I can't believe we woke up in London and are now in Amsterdam" a million times.

We ventured about an hours walk to the Rijksmuseum and the famous I Amsterdam sign where we took pictures and grabbed an ice cream. The next stop was the Van Gogh museum which was just steps away. The most impactful place we've seen so far on our trip for me was the Anne Frank House. It exceeded my expectations and truly blew me away. It was an amazing place to see after everything we've learned about her in school.

We walked around the canals for a little longer before making our way to the famous Red Light District. Yup. It was outrageous. There were naked women in windows and men just knock on the windows and let them in. We saw it. Multiple times: LIKE WHAT. It was so wild. It was really heavily policed and a huge tourist attraction- don't worry mama!

Amsterdam was definitely a unique experience!

Love,
Al

PS. Incase anyone was wondering, I've had the same shirt on since we left Cork for London four days ago...