Live from "The Dam", Spreekt u Engels?

Goedemorgen from Amsterdam,

Having walked our way around the most part of the city over the long weekend, we are getting around with more confidence now. There is still so much to explore and experience, we've barely even scratched the surface. We managed to make our way to several of the local markets here that sell just about everything from Mackerel Sandwiches to Magnets. I'm still amazed how close and well situated everything is.

The first really touristy thing we have done was to make our way to the Heineken Experience [that, and take a massive amount of photo's], a haven for the beer lovers of the world. The old brewery is such a grand place and even if your not a beer person there is still plenty of interesting things to see and do. We even caught a glimpse of the Heineken Horses that still to this day deliver beer along the cobbled streets of the city.

This weekend coming in Amsterdam is the National Museum weekend, so we hope to make our way to a few that are on the top of our list such as the Rembrandt and Van Gogh Museum's. There are just so many Museum's here it is hard to pick a place to start.

There is so much more to tell, but for now here's just a few of the first round of photo's.

One of the many buildings along Prinsengracht

Ness on Prinsengracht

Jim at the Monument on Rembrandt Square

View along the Damrak (Centre of the city)

The Amsterdam Royal Palace on Dam Square

The Tuschinski Theatre

I think everyone knows why I took this photo...

Couldn't pass up that photo, so many of the coffee shops and cafes have rather cool and clever names. We passed another a few streets from Damrak dedicated to Jim Morrison and The Doors.

Hope everyone is doing well, both back home in Aus. and those traversing this wide world of ours. Plenty more photos and posts to come so stay tuned for another knee slapping, rib tickling, Mackerel smoking episode of Ness and Jim in Amsterdam. Tot Ziens, for now.

Dag!

Ness went back to work today and it seems that we have come a long way with relative ease. Any worries were nothing more than that. We've avoided jet lag and mostly settled into our apartment that we will call home for the next 2 months, we even found our local grocery shop.

I had no idea how spacious and well appointed the interior of our apartment would be. The view of the front of the building is deceptive. Our apartment is on the 1st floor [Useless fact No.1: Most of the buildings in Amsterdam are only 4 stories tall so they do not have to have elevators]; wooden floorboards, split level living area, sauna, spa - all the mod. cons. as they say. We are told that we are in the most sort after part of the city.

So far we've only explored the area within about 10 minutes walking distance, but plan to get much further tomorrow. Being Easter weekend it will give us good a chance to get to see the several places of note around the city. Although I'm sure it will take us more than just a few days to make our way to all of the magnificent places, it is just incredible that all of this is possible within a walking distance of 35 minutes. We even have a weekly market less than a minutes walk from us (Noorder Markt).

I have no doubt there will be a plethora of photos to post the next time I make an entry, so until then, Doe voorzichtig.

From Amsterdam with love....

Hello everone,

We made it! After almost 40 hours in transit, flight changes we didn't know about and an hour and a half tarmac delay in Hong Kong we are finally here in Amsterdam. All in all, the flights were OK, if not a little uncomfortable - and finally I understand why people complain about airline food. For the moment we are just settling in, haven't actually got our apartment until later this afternoon but are about to go for our first wander through the city streets.

On first view of coming into the city it is just spectacular, the architecture steeped in hundreds of years of history, the canals - truly incredible. I'm going to keep this post brief, for now, but watch this space for more very very soon.

Regards to everyone.

P.S. T & A - will be great to see you guys soon, looking forward to it.

Europe, here we come...

It's just under 36 hours until we fly out of Sydney. I'd like to send a huge shout out to all of the people that have helped us in getting there especially our families and Nicole at Scenic Tours.

Here are a few photo's of where we are staying in Amsterdam:

View of Lindenstraat

The Scenic Tours office on Keizers-gracht

(about 2 blocks and 3 minutes from Lindenstraat)

Our little townhouse on Lindenstraat, No. 4, ooooh

The next post will be coming to you from Amsterdam, so, until then peace and regards to you all.

It's official.....

We are officially booked to fly now, finally. We are due to fly out on the 3rd of April, on Qantas, at 1045 arriving in Hong Kong at 1745. From Hong Kong we fly Swiss Airlines departing at 2320 arriving in Zurich at 615 the next morning. Finally from Zurich we fly Swiss again departing at 0720 and arrive in Amsterdam at 0900 the morning of the 4th of April.

On the 30th of May we then fly back to Zurich for the 2 months in Switzerland.

For the moment the return trip works pretty much the same and we're currently set to fly back on the 3rd of August. Although that date is yet to be confirmed so we're allowing a couple of days either side just in case.

Despite I was hoping to have a Bangkok layover in order to use the 'Confucius say: Man who walk through airport turnstile sideways go to Bangkok' joke, I take consolation in the likely hood of getting off the plane in Amsterdam and proclaiming, 'I have just flown in from Australia and man are my arms tired'.

Pining for the fjords....

The flights are being booked as I blog and it is just over 3 weeks until we head off to the Northern Hemisphere. It is now definite that we will be in Amsterdam for the first 2 months and then Switzerland for 2 months and it looks like we will be flying out on the 4th of April. I wouldn't say panic is setting in, more so the realisation of how much has to be done before we go and in a such a small amount of time. The feelings of anticipation and excitement are definitely bearing down on us now.

I had several concerns about the fact that finding work in Switzerland would be near to impossible simply due to their laws (that, and because the time in each place is relatively short) so it was a great relief to find out that I will have some general admin/office work with Scenic.

Now the packing and organisation begins.....