Shelby's Travels

Okay! Started the day off strong with a food tour! This is one of my favorite things to do on a trip. As I’ve said before, you learn so much about a culture/country through their food! It’s a great activity to do on your first full day as it helps you get the feel for the area, the history, and the food!

Stop 1: Dutch Apple Pie 🤤always served with whipped cream

Stop 2: Local Dutch Cheese

From 5 gentleman farm – young Gouda (4 weeks), aged Gouda (1 year), gouda with cumin (5 weeks)

Stop 3: Herring in brine, onion, pickle and deep fried cod

Stop 4: Indonesian chicken satay. Amsterdam has a high population of Indonesians and is the top location in the world for Indonesian food besides Indonesia.

Stop 5: Easter raisin bread (brood) with almond filling

Stop 6: Dutch mini pancakes (AMAZING)

We loved the tour!! Our group was all Americans which I was surprised by. But everyone was so so nice (mostly seniors) and asking us about our travels and our lives, it was so nice. We made friends with the two other young people on the tour and made plans to meet up later that night for drinks!

Per our food tour guides recommendation, we bought tickets for a canal tour with Those Dam Boat Guys. it was a small boat so more personal tour rather than the very large 50+ person boats that we saw most of the time. So while we waited for the tour, we grabbed a drink and snack and booked our train/hotel for the next few days.

Then on to the canal tour. We are constantly amazed by how beautiful the city is. It’s walkable, historical, and so beautiful!

We learned that the Netherlands was the first country to legalize gay marriage in 2001.

There is a children’s museum that has a display dedicated to educating kids of the effects and uses of different drugs. And also marijuana is actually not legal. But the country has said they will not detain anyone for using or buying it. They know people will use all kinds of drugs so why not educated them on it to be safe.

Then a little walk on your way to dinner. Recommended by Michael or canal tour guide! A local spot for some hearty Dutch food!

Half chicken and some kind of mashed potato and meatball dish that was sooooo yummy!

AND…… life changing news everyone… I’ve gone my whole life without liking beer. I continue to try them and continue to not like any of them. BUT, I finally found on I enjoy! It’s a blonde from a local brewery in Amsterdam. I actually could not believe it!!

After dinner we went to clean up at the Airbnb and then back out (on a Monday night) to grab drinks with our new friends. We hit a couple bars and then they wanted to see the red light district as they hadn’t walked through it yet. So we went late at night, and it was very interesting… I did a lot of reading online. It’s very regulated but the country. The women get health insurance and pay taxes. Just very interesting to learn about.

And by that time it was 2:30 and we weren’t ready to be done! About the only place open much longer was a karaoke bar!!!!! And our friends actually brought it up soooo of course you know I’m down! So fun! There were some Irish girls there hyping everyone up!

At the end of the night….. we got back by 4:15 and went to sleep by 5am! I don’t even do that at home! But with the time change, we just weren’t tired! So fun to make new friends and get to experience a late night like that!

And……. We had 4 hours of sleep and now off to Belgium!