In case I haven’t mentioned it, I am second generation
Delta. My father was a pilot. He hired on in 1950 and took an early
retirement in 1977, so I could join the Delta family. Back then, Delta’s
anti-nepotism policy prevented both of us from working there at the same
time. Although my father has passed, my mother is still hanging in there
(she’ll be 96 in April). Because she is the un-remarried survivor of a
retiree, she still gets passes. AND she can name a travel
companion. My two brothers take turns each year, being her travel
companion. Truth be told, she doesn’t travel any more (see “96 in April”
above) but that doesn’t stop them. I have travelled with one brother,
Terry, before but never with the other, Tim. And this year is Tim’s year
as the companion.
Anyway… I’ve been travelling a lot since 1977.
Sometimes BJ and I will just grab our passports and head to the airport to see
where we can end up. (A slight exaggeration but it’s close enough to
true). I was ready to get on a plane and the flights to and from Amsterdam over an
upcoming weekend looked pretty good. I asked Tim if he’d like to go and
he jumped on it. As often happens, as we got closer to departure day, the
outbound flights looked less and less “makeable”. On departure day, I
dropped off Tim and BJ (and Lucy) at the airport and headed off to park the
car. BJ and Lucy were on the way to Jacksonville, but had time to accompany Tim out to F
Concourse for our Amsterdam departure. By the time I got back from
parking, and through security, Tim and BJ were at the departure gate, and Tim
was holding the last seat on the plane (in Business Class). As mom’s
travel companion, Tim’s seniority trumps mine! He was unsure about going
by himself, having only been out of the country once before. They had checked
the later AMS flight at it didn’t look particularly good either, but it’s
easier to get one person on plane than two. Anyway, Tim decided he’d wing
it and I would meet up with him at the hotel (DoubleTree next to Centraal
Station) sometime in the future. I figured I had about 3 hours before the
next AMS flight, and it was getting near time for BJ to head to her gate so we
headed off towards her gate. A moment of inspiration had me checking the
Brussels flight and lo and behold it was wide open… but left only 15 minutes
behind the AMS flight and it was in E Concourse. I held Lucy while BJ
modified my PNR and tried to put me on the standby list. Too close to
departure to be added to the list, I gave her back Lucy and took off running
like OJ though the airport. I got to the gate out of breath, explained my
situation and was given a nice seat on the BRU flight. Nine hours and one movie (The Intern) later, I cleared customs and immigration in Brussels, found the direct train to Amsterdam Centraal (3 hours away) and settled in for the ride. When I got on the train, I wasn’t sure how long the trip would take, so around 2 hours in, I got my backpack off of the overhead rack. I took out my “winter raincoat”, the only jacket I was taking on this trip and tossed my bag back overhead. As it turns out, we had another hour before Centraal, and unfortunately, in that last hour, I nodded off. As we passed Schiphol airport, my original Delta destination, I woke up, looked up, and discovered my backpack was gone. Crap. A quick search of the nearby train cars, and a glance up and down the platform revealed nothing. Twenty minutes later, I was at Centraal with my passport, my phone, my wallet, my winter raincoat and the clothes that I was wearing. Five minutes after that, I was at the DoubleTree, where a warm cookie eased my distress. Tim and I discussed strategy, and then decided, “What the heck. We’re in Amsterdam. Let’s go be tourists.” AFTER I go back to Centraal and file a police report regarding my backpack (complete with laptop, kindle, clothing, keys and toiletries).
Tim had gotten to town a few hours before me, so he had
already taken a walk around the area near Centraal Station. On his
stroll, he learned that the ferry across the busy shipping channel was free,
and that there was reputedly an artist colony “over there”. So we jumped
on the three minute ferry, along with about 50 cyclists, and headed across the
water. A quick search revealed nothing artsy, but there was a nice
bar/restaurant (The De Pont) with warmth and wifi. Time for a beer!
(Tim’s a bit of a beer aficionado, so this step would be repeated throughout the trip). We spent some time in De Pont,
then took a quick boat ride back to more familiar-to-me turf. Tim wanted
to see the, uh, culture around Amsterdam so we made our way over towards the
Red Light district. It was Thursday noon-ish, and there wasn’t much going
on there (Not a complaint. Just an observation). We strolled around
the area with no real destination in mind. We’d both heard of “The
Bulldog CoffeeShop” (wink, wink) and here we found 3 on one street!
Popular destinations, it appears.
We stopped in a couple of them, just to see what the hubbub
was all about. (And why there were 3 on one street.) Inside each was an
interesting collection of people. The rules in the “coffeeshops” were a
bit confusing, but provide SOME explanation for the number of them.
Tobacco smoking isn’t allowed in any “hospitality venue”. Tobacco
smoking’s a no-no, but pot smoking is tolerated. Hey, it’s not tobacco.
The Bulldog (and other bars) even supply what they call an “herbal mix”
(non-tobacco), so you CAN light up… just no tobacco. Additionally, if the shop is a “coffeeshop” (meaning they sell marijuana) then
they can’t sell alcohol. One of the 3 Bulldogs on this street (the
Bulldog Café) is simply a bar. We stopped in there as well. As the
afternoon was winding down, we stopped off at Busters,
on the edge of the district for another beer or two. The publican
(publicaan?) at Busters was an interesting fellow; a Brit ex-pat, in fact,
who’d funded the purchase of the bar for a friend, then ended up taking it over
and running it himself. Finished with Busters, we headed back to the
DoubleTree and completed the evening with wine and snacks in the Executive
Lounge.
We walked around the Fashion and Museum district for a bit
and stopped in to the Magna, which is like a mall, built into an impressive old
building. After consulting our city map, we struck off in the direction
of the FoodHallen and located it in short order. Walking in, you are
immediately surrounded by a multitude of smells. It resembles a mall food
court, but the choices are much more diverse; Iberian, Vietnamese, Italian,
Thai, “American”, Indian and several others. And there’s a bar!
That’s something you won’t find at the mall food court. Anyway, I chose
Indian and Tim went with a hybrid; a sausage served on a pretzel roll.
After lunch, and a visit at one of the other retail stores in the “Hallen”, we
struck off for the first of Tim’s five “beer bars”. Closest to the Hallen
was the Craft & Draft so we
dropped in for a pint. There were perhaps 40
beers on draft, and another 50+ in
bottles. I went with a German pilsner and Tim went with his preferred
hoppy IPA. Unfortunately, I failed to note what either of us was drinking so I’ll just say “I had a pilsner and Tim had an IPA”…
everywhere we went. Get used to it. We went to a lot of
places. Looking about in the Crafter & Draft, Tim noticed a flyer for
“Do 4 Bars in 1 Day and get a free T-Shirt”.
As it turns out, four of the five bars Tim wanted to see
were on this flyer! The problem was, in order to get the t-shirt, you had
to end up at Craft & Draft, where we were starting. We quickly
decided that neither of us needed another t-shirt, so we stuck to our
plan. Leaving Craft & Draft, we made the 15 minute hike to stop
number 2; the Proeflokaal (which means “Tasting Room”).
After a short but diligent search, we found it and swung in for another round.
With another 50+ choices of beer, I had the
pilsner and Tim had an IPA. Finishing up there, we jumped on the #1 Tram
towards Centraal and our third stop, the aptly named Beer Temple.
Since it was Friday afternoon, and many of the locals were getting off work, it
was starting to get a little more crowded. The Beer Temple offered yet
another 30+ choices
so I had the pilsner and Tim had an IPA. It was dark by now, and we had
one more beer bar on schedule for the day. In our minds, we would earn
that t-shirt anyway. It was a short hike to the 4th stop on
our pub crawl; Arendsnest.
Apparently that means “Eagle’s Nest” and is named that because the owner is
bald… like an eagle, or so it was explained to us. This place was hopping
but we found a two top and settled in for a beer. I had the pilsner and
Tim had an IPA. We would save the 5th beer bar for
tomorrow. We took the short ride back to Centraal on the #1 Tram and
swung by the hotel to drop off Tim’s backpack. I didn’t have a
backpack. Have I mentioned my backpack loss? We headed back
out. Tim wanted to make one more pass through the red light district;
this time at night. We headed off in the general direction and then
followed the crowds. After all the beer I’d had, I was suddenly struck
with the need for a bathroom break. We ducked into The Tapvreugd where I found the WC… and had the pilsner. Continuing our
walkabout, Tim finally got to see what the district is all about; the women in
the windows. We don’t understand the draw but to each his own. After one more quick stop for a pilsner and an IPA at Busters, we headed back to the DoubleTree, took a trip to the top floor
to check out the Sky Bar (beautiful, but crowded and noisy on a Friday night)
and then called it a night. When we got back to the room, I decided that
three days in the same clothes, without a toothbrush or my blood pressure meds,
was probably enough. I told Tim that I was heading home Saturday, on the
1pm flight. That way we could have breakfast together and plan out
Tim’s Saturday (since he had decided to stay) before I had to head to Schiphol.
Saturday morning, I woke up around 6am and couldn’t get back
to sleep. I guess I was ready to get home. As I was getting dressed
Tim woke up. I explained that I would feel stupid if I waited around for
the 1 o’clock flight, and didn’t get on it, if I COULD have gotten on the
morning flight. I left the hotel at 7:30 and was through security and
customs and at the gate by 8:30. When I checked in for the flight, I was really
glad I had bothered to fill out some paperwork at the police station. The
police officer had given me a copy of the report, in Dutch, which was
meaningless to me. You see, when you check in for a flight and don’t
check a bag, and you aren’t carrying ANY carry-on baggage, you apparently
trigger an alarm. Supervisor please! Anyway, the paperwork got me
past the security questions and earned me a good bit of sympathy from the
screeners. At the gate, I dropped off my boarding card with the agent, who
asked me if I was willing to ride in coach if business wasn’t available.
I was. Around 0930 she let me know that I wasn’t likely to get on the
flight at all, so I switched over to the AMS to BOS flight. Interestingly
enough, when I checked in, that agent also asked if I was
willing to ride in coach, if business class wasn’t available. Apparently
this is standard practice at AMS. About the time I realized that I
wouldn’t get out of Boston Saturday night, BJ texted me to tell me that Tim had
changed his mind as was on his way to Schiphol to go for the 1pm flight.
I changed back over to the afternoon Atlanta nonstop, went through the security
questions again, showed my police report once more, and told THIS agent that I
would sit in coach “if I had to”. Although it was close, Tim and I both
got on the nonstop to Atlanta, in coach, and made it home. I watched The
Martian, Spectre and the Paul Newman racing story, among other things. I
was glad to be on the plane and headed home… but I must admit, I prefer
business class. J.
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