Never Netherland

We arrived in Rotterdam at about 6:30 in the morning after a coach journey across virtually the whole of Germany, the coach was pretty comfortable for me, sadly Nina got a chair which didn't recline so she didn't get to experience the true comfort. After all this travelling we seemed to have got really use to sleeping on the go and whilst we were both knackered upon arrival we had at least managed to get 3 or 4 hours on the 12 hour trip. We got dropped of about 100 meters from the central train station which is where we had to get our tram from, we were staying in a hostel called 'Room' and for once the directions they provided were perfect and after waiting 15 minutes for a tram and the 5 minute journey after that we found ourselves at the door waiting to be let in. On entry we were greeted by an Aussie guy who commented on the fact that we looked dead and apologised that the room would not be ready until 2pm, we were fine with this as it's what we expected, he did however let us grab breakfast for free and our peanut butter sandwiches went down a treat, eventually we left the hostel again to find something to entertain us for the next 7 hours, the host did advised however that we would struggle to find anything until at least 10 because at the weekend the city just doesn't wake up.

The host (we really should have been more careful about taking names) gave us a map so we had a rough idea where to head it also helped us to see how tiny Rotterdam actually was. After taking a quick stroll down to harbour to catch a bit of the sun rise we headed to the town centre and too the market. On arrival at the market square we realised that either we were up way to early or market traders were far more lazy in the Netherlands than they are anywhere else, it was pushing 8'o'clock and half the stalls were not even nearly set up, still we spent a good hour or so getting in the way and getting puzzled looks, naturally there was a few fish stalls which entertained us for sometime although the fact that that the crabs were still alive freaked Nina out a little bit, we did attempt to find where people were getting their hot drinks from as it was absolutely freezing but we had no luck and ended up getting hot drinks in McDonalds after grabbing a newspaper and a copy of some trashy girls mag for Nina, we ended up making a couple of drinks last a couple of hours before deciding to head back towards the hostel. On route the temperature finally convinced Nina that she could go no longer without a jacket and she decided it was a good idea to go to C&A (i know!!!! why did they all close in England???) and hunt out a coat there and then despite us both starting to feel the lack of a proper nights sleep start to take effect, after a little while she did realise i was going to veto every coat she showed me and decided it would be an activity to pick up on another day.

We got back to the hostel and were able to check straight in, the Room hostel has dorms and private rooms and all of them are themed, we were giving two beds in the 'Port Room' a room which is decorated with various sea port related objects, quite a nice idea but we didn't really take time to appreciate it too much we were far too tired, instead we just slept until 7 that evening when we woke up and decided to head out to find some grub, we down to the reception to find another Aussie behind the desk and he gave a recommendation for a good cheap restaurant a short walk away called 'Bazaar', he gave it a real good plug and it sounded really nice so off we went. Bazaar turned out to be a huge popular restaurant which specialises in Middle Eastern/North African cuisine, luckily they were able to squeeze us in and the food was absolutely awesome, service, portion size and price were all perfect (once we got an English menu that is). After polishing of our meals we headed to a nearby bar a bit further down the road and whipped out our Backgammon set and as Nina beat a few times over a couple of beers the fun seemed to have gone out of it for me, however after a few more glasses of wine back at the hostel it all got better as I came out on top.

The following morning we decided we would head to the Euromast which is not dissimilar to the T.V. tower which we visited in Berlin, we didn't quite take the quickest route there, a fact we realised as we found ourselves wandering around the grounds of the hospital, in the end however we did find our way and after crossing a couple of main roads we soon found ourselves on a tree lined pathway which looked amazing in all the colours autumn brings. The Euromast cost us about 8 Euros each which can be discounted if you buy a Rotterdam card, but given the size of Rotterdam it probably isn't a worthwhile investment unless you are really really lazy. we were relieved to see that there was an elevator to the top rather than just stairs, however this relief soon vanished as we stepped out onto the first viewing platform and promptly had out breath taken away by the gale force winds and noticed the spiral stair case up to the main viewing platform. The main platform is a rotating seating area which rises up and down the tower whilst rotating, once entering the seating area the doors are closed and the platform rises and commentary in Dutch, English and German lets you know what you are seeing, whilst the view were not spectacular (other than those over the harbour) you could see for miles, we realised as we were getting off that there were also windows below our feet as well (so if you do go don't forget to look down). Getting blasted by icy gales was the final straw for Nina and once we got back down to solid ground we went and gave C&A another shot.

With Nina now snug and warm in her new jacket we took a little wander around the city centre before heading to the restaurant and booking a table for later in the evening and then headed over to the Maritime museum, in the end of the day we though as Rotterdam is one of the busiest ports going it should be quite interesting, sadly we were wrong and struggled to stay awake whilst wandering round trying to feign interest. There was a pretty good exhibition on the Berliner Disaster though which was its only shining light. My advise would be if you are heavily into all things Maritime then this is a definite, if you have nothing more than a passing interest then give it a wide birth.

That evening we headed back to the Bazaar restaurant for some more delicious food and attempted to go to same bar as the previous night but in was a Sunday and they were shutting at 9:30, therefore we headed straight back to the hostel to drinking in the bar there, we spent a few hours playing backgammon and then Nina left me to get on with my blog and struck up conversation with one of the Aussie hosts. We all ended up chatting until the early hours, the Aussie guy had so many 'just one mores' that we lost count and as he went to get on his bike to cycle home we couldn't bare to look. The following morning we made it our of the room about 5 mins before we were due to check out and decided to walk to the station to get a train to Amsterdam, it turned out that the station was a little further away than we thought but it was still only 30 mins with our back pack so it wasn't too bad.

The journey from Rotterdam to Amsterdam took about and hour and half, after some of the journeys we have done this just flew by, once again we had excellent directions to our hostel and was there within about 30 mins of arriving in the city. We quickly realised that the hostel was to be nothing like that which we had stayed in before, it was a lot more bureaucratic with the host being totally miffed as to why we hadn't printed out our hostel booking confirmation or noted our reference (despite the fact that no other hostel had asked for it anywhere else), in the end though we convinced her we had a booking, in the end of the day all she had to was look at the computer. Alongside the paper work demands the hostel also had the steepest, thinnest steps ever and we really did struggle up them. When we found out our room was on the 4th floor we were gutted, a feeling that doubled when we got to the fourth floor to find the toilet had been ripped out and a crazy DIY enthusiast was doing his best to fix it, we thought that maybe our luck of booking good hostels had finally ran out on our very last booking. We dumped our stuff and headed off into the city.

Amsterdam is an amazing city, for every bar there are at least two coffee shops or cafes, for every gift shop there is a sex shop, for every art or culture museum there is a hemp or cannabis museum and for every dutch resident there is probably about 20 tourists, all drawn there for there own reason and all off them seemingly just there to have fun. In a place where various light drugs and prostitution are all legal (and possibly even encouraged) it is amazing that we saw absolutely no trouble whatsoever, we saw the odd person getting force fed sugar water after over indulging a bit too much, but this seemed to be accepted by staff and dealt with in a very professional and responsible manner.

We spent the time we were there just exploring the city taking the sights and visiting a few of the museum which could be classed cultural and certainly educational and also popping down to the red light district in the evening, only to window shop though. It's an area which many may frown upon and maybe scared to visit however we found it amazing and really enjoyed wondering around as many other non buyers were too. The girls themselves were pretty much all absolutely stunning however if any of you fancy going to splash some cash just watch out for anyone in a blue lit window rather than the traditional red lit window.

The dorm turned out to be OK except the first morning when the DIY guy decided to use the noisiest power tool he could possibly find to finish fixing the toilet and asides from the rude awakening in the morning we had to give the chap his dues as when we returned the following evening there was a fully operational toilet. That being said on the third floor there were several buckets laid out collecting water that was dripping from our floor, we didn't see any signs of flooding and the ceiling never collapsed whilst we were there. After 3 nights in Amsterdam it was time to finally head home. With chins up we headed to Schipol Airport which was quite simply the best airport going, it was just totally organised and there is plenty to do there. The flight home was so short that we decided straight away that we certainly would be returning to the Netherlands, we also realised on our way home that neither of us were quite ready to grow up just yet and as we collected our luggage from the carousel in the south terminal at Gatwick both our minds were ticking over to the next big trip, oh and the curry we had been promised by Ninas mum.