Hi Everyone at home its mike this time so hoprfully its as entertaining as beks ones.

We arrived in amsterdam on tuesday the 20th, i know im a bit late writin this one but better late than never ay. So our bus ride wasnt too bad took about 5 hours which didnt seem that long.

We checked into the hostel which was really nice, as nice as a hotel.......... except for the fact that we share a room with 5 other people but still very good for a hostel, nice restaurant and bar with happy hour which we scabs took full advantage of .After we checked in we went for a bit of a walk around the area it was pretty far out of town so mainly residential area but just explored a bit anyway. We had dinner that night with adam and jill, another couple from busabout who we were hanging out with in the last few places. Had a big buffet at the hostel which was 10 euros each but being the tight backpackers we r we just bought 1 and bek kept goin up to get the food, good feed for 5 euros each. We had a few drinks at happy hour and went to bed afterwards.

After a nice sleep in for me we had arranged to meet up with the others from busabout at a coffee shop in the red light district. We hung around there for a while thenwent to a pub for some early dinner and a few drinks then we went and wandered around the red light district which was interesting to say the least (certain aspects of our adventures which did not effect the overall outcome have been omitted for safe reading by parents.) So we explored a bit checked out the girls in the windows and a few late night food stands. Came back and crashed ready for the next day.

We were up a little earlier for our walking tour which we had quite high expectations after the paris one, turned out not bad but not a whole heap to hear about amsterdam after the obvious so felt a little drawn out but still good to learn a bit more of the history, and suprisingly its not all about sex and drugs which im sure the oldies will be happy to hear. After that we headed to the anne frank museum which bek was very exited about, me, unsure. Was actually quite interesting even me not knowing the story much and bek loved it and insists that i watch the movie when we get home. We had dinner from the bar with adam and jill and had a few beers at happy hour and of to bed, or so we thought.......... we met one of our room mates when came up and he very interesting, and by that i mean weird. First of all he was a big african american about 50 years old from oakland and told us he was there on business, which we highly doubted. His business idea was to feed catfish marijuana for a while and then when he cooks them the people who eat it will get stoned, perfectly normal idea..........he then told us that in a few years that he would be famous and everyone would no his name.So he was here to buy seeds to post back to canada to start his little business.He then tells us that he used to be homeless a few years ago and that he was from the hood, a gangsta from birth he called it, then he decides that we are also gangsters because years ago we were all convicts, so now we r brothers! He was full of stories like the one that he was a successful bbq chef back home and has a secret sauce that Tyra Banks', the famous supermodel, family is trying to steal from him, she is supposedly part of a massive inbread family that all have 'big ol round punkin heads' and bad b.o and they are all over the world, trying to steal his sauce recipe, at this point bek decides to sleep with her handbag that night, and every night after that. So after talking to us for about 2 hours we finally got to go to sleep.

The next day we got up early and went to hire bikes to go for a ride out to the country to the cheese and clog factory, very cultured of us indeed, We were a bit nervous riding them at first because they r all the old granny style bikes with 1 gear and crappy brakes, but we made it out of the city and it was a very nice relaxing ride. We had a little picnic on the canal with adam and jill which consisted of stolen bread and cold meats from the breakfast buffet and a few warm beers that were cooled by lowering them into the canal in a plastic bag to get them cold, didnt really work but worth a try.We figured out that we know all the same people that jill knows because she went to carine in the year below us and her and bek had even dated the same guy as jill. We got back in the arvo and had a little nap then went out for cheap italian near the hostel followed by happy hour and then bed.

We slept in the next day then went out to see the I amsterdam sign and had a quick lunch there. We came back and did our washing and i read all about the eagles win which was some good footy news for a change. We went for a little picnic in the park near the hostel as our dinner and then later atended happy hour as was the ritual of the last few nights and went to bed after that.

We are in berlin now but bek will tell uz all about that in the next few days.

Interesting fact number 3: There are 750,000 people in the main city of amsterdam and 1,000,000 bikes with about 20,000 ending up in the canals after being stolen or after rowdy bucks nights.

Take care everyone love bek and mike.