Amsterdam: Day 1

Trying to get iPhoto to work resulted in a delay of posting; my apologies.


After a reasonably uneventful trip, though one where screaming children prevented any in-flight rest for us and others, we arrived in Amsterdam without issue, to discover that our apartment is even more wonderful than we hoped.

The living room

The kitchen

The view from the window

Looking down the canal

We're on the 3rd floor of the 2nd building on the left

We went and explored the neighborhood a bit, finding grocery stores, bank machines and other such stuff. We saw row upon row of houseboats.

We saw churches, big and small.

Westkerk

Westkerk

Westkerk's bell tower

Oude Kerk

Oude Kerk's other half

A tiny church in the middle of nowhere

We saw cool Amsterdam buildings, many of which lean in interesting ways.

The upper half leans

I'm not sure all of these are upright

Some are designed to lean towards the canals. Those things sticking out of the buildings are hoists. Staircases in Amsterdam are steep and narrow and not good for moving things up and down, so you hoist stuff up and down the hoists. Some buildings lean outwards to avoid bashing things being hoisted against the walls. Some hoists are kinda funky.

This gargoyle guards the hoist

And then you have the canals themselves, every one of which is picturesque.

A quiet canal

Parking, Amsterdam style

A treed canal

In the evening, we went for a walk in the Red Light district. You don't take pictures there. All I can say is that it strikes me that if one is going to advertise like that, it would be more helpful if the product on display was not only well displayed (which some of them were), but that the product itself was worth buying.


On a side note, the Dutch Basketball League is into playoffs. Three former Calgary Dinos play in the league on three different teams. Two of those teams are competing in the finals, and they are being held in Leiden, a mere hour away. So I spent part of today attempting to decipher the Dutch basketball's site on where the games were being played and how to get tickets.