Our Bed & Breakfast

The flow of visitors has come to an end for now. Over the past 2 months, we have enjoyed visits from our friends Emily and Bryan from Baltimore, Stacy from New York, and Ryan from Baltimore who joined Kristen, who now lives in Stuttgard, and Brian, who now lives in Vienna. Herewith I will share with you the highlights of these visits: Emily and Bryan - September While Emily and Bryan were here, all of our electronic equipment stopped working and I got fired from my job. It was their first trip to Europe, and we all joked that they'd get divorced before returning home. Of course they didn't, and we are all glad for that. They were really two of our most easy going guests, and having them was an absolute pleasure. The Saturday of their arrival was spent walking around the Jordaan, and in the evening dinner then the red light district. These two people were probably the most relaxed and least fazed by the sights at the red light district. Their calm was really quite fascinating. We headed to a bruin cafe for a chat afterwards. We spent about 20 minutes in the wee hours of Sunday morning staring in the window of an orthopedic, geriatric, incontinence supply store a few doors down from our apartment. Here we discussed the crutches, catheters, pantyhose, thick grip utensils and sippy cups displayed and marveled at how getting old must really suck. The weather was spectacular for them. On Sunday we got pancakes, took a canal cruise, ate vlaamse frites and drank small beers. We walked around a lot - I think they really got to see most of the city on foot. We also spent a lot of time on our balcony since the weather was so good, just people watching and snapping pictures of people doing weird things on their bikes. On Monday they headed to Belgium to continue their Euro-trip. Stacy - September/October This was Stacy's third visit since we've been in Amsterdam, and if you count the two weekends she was here as separate visits(she went to visit another friend in Brussels in between),then you could say third and fourth. It's always great to see her smiling face brighten Amsterdam's dismal weather. Since Stacy had already seen a lot of the tourist things, it was just max and relax time. The Saturday that she arrived, we took her to a houseboat bar then took a canal cruise. Stacy is a fellow foodie, so we took her to all the great restaurants, including Indian, Spanish tapas and Thai (which the Dutch call Thais - which is funny). On Sunday while walking around and enjoying the weather, Matt and I saw the perfect bookcase. It came in separate pieces. We've been looking for one that would work in our apartment and that didn't cost 800 euros, which has been difficult. So we got 4 pieces and made Stacy carry one back to our apartment. You have to work if you come visit! We went to a cafe in our neighborhood on Sunday night for a drink before dinner, and while we were hanging out on the couches, a photographer came up to us and asked if he could snap photos of us. He was shooting pictures for an article in a local mag about playing games in the Amsterdam cafes. A lot of the cafes in Amsterdam have little games that you can play, like chess, checkers and monopoly. We picked Kolonisten, a game that we learned from some friends, set it up and let the guy take pictures of us pretending to play. Beers had to be involved in the photos, and Matt helped the guy with suggestions for interesting pictures and was a hand model for several of the shots. So now we're kind of celebrities. Ryan, Kristen and Brian - October This was Ryan's second visit to Amsterdam. His friend from college, Kristen, recently moved to Stuttgard because her husband is an officer in the army and got stationed there. Our friend Brian from Baltimore also recently moved to Europe and now lives in Vienna. So they were all invited to join Ryan during his weekend here. Ryan arrived on a Thursday. I picked him up from the airport and then we went to a nearby cafe for lunch. After he finished telling me a story about how after his running club practiced one night, they went to a bar to get food and an hour later the waitress came by to tell them she had lost their ticket and they had to order again, I realized the same thing may have just happened to us. An hour after we arrived, we noticed people that came after us get their food. By this time, we were too hungry to speak to each other anymore. I asked the waitress about our order, which was taken by another waitress who had just left, and she knew nothing about it. Irony is great, isn't it? After eating, we walked around a bit and found a game store that had a Buffy the Vampire Slayer board game in the window. 30 euros and a short dispute with the store owner about who the biggest Buffy fan was (him or me) later, we walked back to the apartment to set up my new game. It was very complicated, and at first, not very fun. But we gradually learned, and when Matt came home we made him play too. And then when Brian and Kristen arrived the next day, them too. We played about 9 times that weekend. On Friday before Brian arrived, the three of us (Matt, Ryan and me) walked around and decided to stop in the Sex Museum, which was recommended highly by our friend Rowena in Baltimore. It was a very disturbing experience and I will now put it out of my mind. We walked over to Dam Square and found a little carnival going on. They had one of those swing rides that circle around and go real high. Ryan and I decided to go. What we failed to calculate was how cold it would be up there, and how fast the ride was going. We were scared, cold and dizzy. So in other words, we had fun. Later on Friday, Brian arrived around 4 and Kristen around 8. Once our party was complete we took them to the red light district for dinner at a great little Thai restaurant. Then we walked over to the windows. On Saturday we got pancakes, then they did the tourist thing while Matt and I just chilled and made a 5-person dinner. After dinner, we went to a bar to watch the rugby finals, then over to a bar where a friend was having her birthday party. We then stopped over at the Dam Square carnival one more time for Ryan to ride a crazy baton ride. On Sunday it was the Amsterdam marathon, and after Ryan missed his chance to run the half, we all headed over to the Vondelpark to watch the runners go by. Then we laid down some towells and Matt found a huge stick. Since Ryan randomly had a baseball with him, we decided to play. The stick got smaller and smaller with every hit. Ryan came close to getting beheaded with it one time when Matt hit the ball and the stick cracked in half. The half of the stick that broke off went as far as the ball. AFter the stick was no longer useful as a bat, we improvised and played long-distance throwing competitions and a weird golf game that we made up. Then some vicious dogs came over, barking and chasing and humping each other, and we decided to play a game of Uno then leave. It was a full day of playing, it was like we were 8 years old again. Then fun didn't end when we got home, though, b/c we then played another game of Buffy.

Le Rugby

On the weekend of October 12 Matt and I and our friends Ross and Sascha drove down to Paris. The drive was about 5 hours, including a pit stop, and very easy (especially since we weren't driving). The semi-finals for rugby were also going on that weekend in Paris, and in a surprising turn of events, France had beat Australia the week before so were still in it. Needeless to say there was a lot of excitement in the air.

We arrived around midnight, and checked into our roach motel. All the hotels in Paris were booked that week. In addition to the rugby tournament, that weekend was also the annual festival in Montmartre, as we would later find out. Our hotel was in a great location, but the rooms were pretty scary. I'm talking hairs in the sheets and very thin walls so you can hear everything going on in every room around you. We quickly dropped our bags off as soon as we arrived and jetted off to find some nice Parisian food. However, it was very late and a lot of the cafes were already closed or closing. We chanced upon a pretty lively place called the Hippopotamus, which was open late. Here, at 2am, we ate medium rare hamburgers.

The next day we met up around 10:30 and decided to forego the 5 euro breakfast at the hotel, figuring if our rooms were what they were for 140 euros, then what must the 5 euro breakfast be like. Matt guessed it was probably a coffee and a cigarette. We headed to the Museum d'Orsay, the impressionist museum that Matt and I missed during our trip in Easter. The museum is absolutely beautiful inside, and has some pretty spectacular sculptures, and works by Rodin, Klimt and Munch.

After perusing the D'Orsay we made for the Champs Elysses to have apps and a bottle of wine at a trendy bar/restaurant that came recommended. After some overpriced snacks that left us feeling less than full, we walked a bit more to find a nice terrace at a Parisian cafe, where we ate and drank some more. We then went over to the Arc de Triomphe and climbed to the top. We spent quite a bit of time checking out the views and, mainly, watching traffic trying to get around that monstrous traffic circle. It's quite fascinating - like an almost organized chaos. Sascha and I then counted SmartCars - those tiny little death machines famous in Europe that the US is trying to introduce. Between 6:24 and 6:30 on Saturday, October 13, there were no less than 25 SmartCars making their way around the northwest side of the Arc de Triomphe. Or maybe it was southeast. You get the point.

Matt's friend and former colleague that used to work in Paris recommended a few bars for us to go to watch the rugby game at 9. One of them was an Aussie bar that we tried to arrive to early but even an hour before the game it was already crazy packed. It was full of unattractive New Zealand guys and trashy English girls, loud and smoky. Sascha and I were definetely not having fun, but the guys seemed to be enjoying themselves. The last straw came when the waiter accidentally poured some beer down the back of my cashmere sweater. We left and tried to find a more "decent" locale to watch the game. This new place came in the form of a cafe with a crazy waitress that kept moving us around the restaurant as more people tried to squeeze in. It was a good game, but unfortunately England beat France, so the anticipation of victory in the air all day Saturday turned into the dismay of defeat come late Saturday night.



On Sunday we slept in a bit, then headed out for some coffee and cappuccinos then went over to the Eiffel tower. That day was the Paris 20k race, which was just finishing up at the Eiffel Tower park when we arrived, so lots of runners were out walking around. We got in line to climb to the top. It was again a beautiful day, and 668 steps up later, we were looking at Paris from the top of the tower. Sascha pointed out to us the area in Paris that we would be going to that afternoon - Montmartre. Unfortunately we were too high up to count Smart Cars that day. After soaking in the sights and some rays from the top, we headed back to the metro to go to Montmartre.

By the time we arrived in Montmartre, we were all hungry and kind of grumpy. Finding food was a priority. Montmartre is at the top of a hill, so more climbing. After quite a bit of walking, we chanced upon a perfect little Italian style cafe that was virtually empty. The kitchen was closing but we convinced the waitress to feed us. After lunch we felt rejuvenated, and continued our walk to the top of the hill. Sunday was also the day of the Montmartre festival, so there were little tents set up all over selling wine and sausages and other fares. There is a beautiful church at the top, and another great view on the steps. It was so busy though that at first we couldn't even find the steps down. It turned out that there was a guy at the bottom playing guitar and singing, and the steps were packed with people sitting and listening to him. Very cool.





We then had to rush back to our hotel to collect our things and the car to make the long drive back to Amsterdam. We left Paris at about 6, and arrive in Amsterdam close to 11. Pretty amazing that we just drove down to Paris for the weekend!