GerBeny: Amsterdam I Am

Now that was a weekend!

I left work at 11 on Friday to go on a brewery tour paid for by an associated company (EGS Automatisierungstechnik GmbH). After listening to the obligatory hour-long presentation, we had a quick lunch and set off into the depths of the Fürstenberg brewery. We toured around the facilities as I struggled to understand the tour guide, and finished off with a few complementary beers in the cavernous hall in the basement of the building. This was a good start.

At 9:30 that night, I hopped on the train that would take me to the train to Amsterdam.

Excitement setting in

This was my accommodation for the night

I woke up in the morning to a very flat Netherlands landscape about an hour out of Amsterdam. I bided my time talking to three stocky, motherly, middle-aged Croatian schoolteachers while the train slowly rolled towards its destination. They offered sweets to people and were merry.

Walking out of the station, I looked at a map, set off, and immediately got lost. I wandered around for an hour before backtracking and finding the Flying Pig Hostel:

Even at 11am the place was lively; people were playing pool, drinking at the bar, and smoking in the back room (not cigarettes, mind you).

I couldn't help but smile back at the legoman every time I went back to my room

Before anything Amsterdamy happened, I wanted to check out some of the real history of the city. The Amsterdam Museum had universally rave reviews, and was my first stop.

I'm not one to support ivory as an artistic medium, but this is seriously impressive

Various legal and illegal drugs

Amsterdam used to host public lobotomies for those who could afford the tickets

After getting my 3-hour taste of the genuinely fascinating background of Amsterdam, I hopped over to Begijnhof. This was a gorgeous 14th-century enclosed courtyard previously occupied women who lived like nuns but didn't take their monastic vows. The courtyard contained two churches - one in the open and the other hidden in one of the buildings, and was like a little oasis in the middle of a bustling, sin-tastic city.

I walked around for a while before heading back to the hostel. The city is gorgeous by day:

The town hall, built on 13,659 wooden piles

No idea where I spotted these segwayers

A quick moment of quiet on the streets

Just your typical canal

Late in the afternoon, I went back to the hostel to relax a bit before figuring my night out. One of the guys in the room was wearing an Edmonton Oilers hat - pretty easy conversation starter. Turns out Travis, Ryan and Evan were three Edmontonians doing the whole Eurotrip thing, so we grabbed a few beers at the bar and decided what the plan was for the night.

We started by wandering around a bit:

No city is safe from football celebrations

Not sure what these guys were on about

We went to a few different places and did a few things, including "window shopping" in the red light district. That was certainly eye-opening - I somehow imagined the prostitutes would be somewhat distanced from the street, allowing you to walk by leisurely. Nope. You squeeze through crowded, narrow alleyways with full-height glass patio doors and women eying you at eye-level, often just a foot or two away.
I was also surprised by the number of people in the area - it's a major tourist attraction, and felt oddly safe and clean. We made it back to the hostel alive and in possession of all our belongings, and crashed for the night.

The next day assumed a fairly leisurely pace. Late in the morning we walked to the Van Gogh museum to check out some amazing artwork and relax in the sun in the neighbouring park.