Land of cheese rounds, wooden shoes and propeller buildings

We got back from roughly four days hanging out in Utrecht and Amsterdam with Emre & Patti (and with Cougar the dog and for a beer with Jephta the friend.) Roughly four days because travel time took much longer each way than either of us expected when you factor getting-to-airport time. Next time, no RyanAir. Even if it is half the price of flying into Schiphol. And they just basically confirmed the rumor that they plan to charge passengers to use airplane bathrooms.

We checked out Amsterdam, which I had never done before. It was kind of a cold and rainy gray day, so we took a boat tour around the city, saw an exhibition at the Amsterdam annex of the Hermitage Museum, ate and drank a lot. We also walked all over the place, and yes, the red light district IS crazy and yes, people do spark up joints all over the place. The smell of pot was nearly omnipresent. 

Rounds of gouda in a window.

We spent the rest of the time in Utrecht, and it was gorgeous...sunny and warm and cute. And of course, more eating and more drinking and more walking and more boating (we took out a pedal boat on the canal.) We went to Tivoli to see Rodrigo y Gabriela, who were awesome live (I couldn't help dancing, even despite still feeling a bit under the weather.) The things they can do with just two guitars...wow.

We have to go back soon because we didn't get to do Keukenhof tulips, see enough windmills or wooden shoes, and didn't eat nearly enough stroopwafels. And it was WAY too short to hang out with Emre & Patti.

Here are a few more pictures: