Rotterdam, the hostel was pretty well run – themed rooms. CutCopy were playing the night we turned up, but tickets were all sold out unfortunately. We hit up happy hour at the hostel before a couple of other places before calling it a night. The next day we went on a walking tour run by the hostel, and it was a good introduction to the biggest port in Europe. Oh and when we arrived, we found ourselves an all you can eat ribs place – which is only 11.90 Euros on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
We left in the late afternoon to Amsterdam. We arrived here, and the hostel is… kind of horrible. No wifi here. Well there is, its part of the Sofitel Hotel thats around the corner, so I’m using that. I’ve been told there are a few wardrivers around which spraypaint houses which have unsecured wireless connections. I haven’t spotted any though.
Walking through Amsterdam, you can just smell the coffee shops, and they are everywhere. There is one opposite our hostel. Theres been mixed information from different people, but it seems like, marijuana is not legal here, but the Dutch have a way of turning a blind eye to it. So in a way, its legal to find it and buy it and smoke it, but not legal to supply it to the shops… and its not legal to grow it. They are just everywhere.
We met up with one if Nick’s friends from Copenhagen and he showed us around Amsterdam. He’ll be coming out with us tonight. Last night, just a few quiet drinks and a scary walk through the red light district. Basically walking down one narrow lane way, and 3 people in total stopped us, said “This is my lane, you’ve been looking in my lane, you have to pay me now.” Kinda scary, but we escaped unharmed, so alls well. It didn’t help that I had a bit of money on me. Luckily no backpack, so no camera gear. Today – walking tour to learn a bit more about Amsterdam and how much of a tolerant city it is, and really about the Dutch sense of humour.
Tomorrow we’ll most probably hire bikes to check out the parks in the area and a couple museums. I might end up heading to Hoorn (sp?) in saturday during the day, to check out the local parkour action there.
We are here until friday night, but spending saturday night at Nick’s friends place in Amsterdam, so the internet situation might be a little scarce, so blogging might be a bit of an issue.
Written by Milton Lai