Okay, sorry, I'm a bit behind.

I typed up my best blog yet and once again cyber space has it, so I threw a temper tantrum, cried and needed to pout for a day....but I'm back

We got going with a full day of three trains, a plane and a bus ride to go from Zermatt, Switzerland to our hotel in Amsterdam, Netherlands. What we notice is that we are now kicking arse on the Swiss trains. We got it figured out. Nothing spectacular happened besides philosophy guy on the plane sitting the other side of Dominique, made a good natured comment, when I said how brutally cramped the seats were. He suggested that maybe I needed to be thinner.... I was going to rip his philosophy book out of his hand and beat on him while asking "if a book hits you in the head, does it really hurt?" Only problem is, I was folded into the seat and couldn't move.

When we arrive, we are trying to figure out do we need to clear customs being a Canadian citizen, coming from a non E U country. Two signs "cutoms, nothing to declare" and "customs, goods to declare". Well, we have a bottle of wine, cigars and a bottle of rum. So what do we do??? Everyone is disappearing past the numerous nothing to declare doors out of site. We find a "goods to declare" area and stand by the counter, but not a customs guy can be found. Huh,

We go back to the "no goods to declare" area and speak to either a cop or a customs guy who was just standing passing the time. We tell him our dilemma and seek his advise, which ends turning into a BS travel with him for 5 minutes about our trip....no passports shown, but he did comment on our good wine and rum and said have a good night. I don't know if that was customs or was he just a cop messing with us.

Having arrived in Amsterdam, we hopped on the shuttle to our hotel. Best part was when a nice young Dutch lad of 30 yrs offered Dominique his seat. Yep, she is now a old lady.

Our hotel is a nice hotel and not a budget room. But they don't supply ice machines nor do they have pop machines or a store you can buy a pop while in the hotel...okay we gotta grab some cokes and ice...down Dominique goes and sweet talks the bartender into selling us two Cokes and a bucket of ice for a euro...for the record, in Zermatt those two Cokes would literally be 10 euros.

A quiet night in drinking that sweet rum and Coke, all is good in the world

Next day up at nine, on the (free)shuttle back to the airport at 9:30. Schipol airport in Amsterdam is not just an airport but is the main hub for trains underneath the airport. So it was suggested by the hotel to take the shuttle from the hotel back to the airport, and then grab train tickets to central station in Amsterdam which would cost 5 euros each. All goes good, and we get there and the old area is amazing. We leave the immediate area and find a restaurant that serves real breakfasts, so we sit down and have eggs, sausage toast and coffee on a sidewalk restaurant with a heated awning, and a little blanket to cover your legs since it is fall here.....temp was 15 C.....meal was great costs us 15 euros....Again, in Zermatt that would be easily 60 euros.

We wander around and pop into various stores and shops, and I could'nt help myself when we went into a bakery that had a waffle with pistachio icing on it, heated...it was friggin amazing.

We made our way to Anne Frank's house, but you can only get tickets online and when I tried back in September, the tickets were sold out for that day.. they open up at 3:30 but the line was already 100 deep at 11am. The history of the building and her tale is quite chilling. Just thinking of having your country occupied and people oppressed because of religion baffles myself.

Anyway, we popped by an Amsterdam Coffee house and enjoyed the experience. We were laughing so hard being the oldest people there and not knowing what we are doing. Great, great fun.

Then off to an Argentinian steak house and had a full rack of ribs and Dominque a beautiful chicken salad with Cokes for 35 euros....my lord it's cheap...

We continue to wander and we're going to go on a canal cruise but sitting on the edge of the canal watching the boats pass, and see the consistent " oh my god, get me off this boat, I'm bored look" we decide against it... walking the canals and seeing all the boats moored in the canals was neat. I remember watching a show on the Amsterdam housing boat trend and it was really neat to see it in person,

Well, we were done for the day back to the train station to go to the airport. Then catch a shuttle to the hotel and in for the night....great day and of all the cities this one was our favourite.....now, seeing the sites in London, Rome, Athens and Naples was great, but for the overall feel, this was our favourite city.

Tomorrow we take a shuttle, train ride and bus ride to Gierthoorn.

Talk then