Day 3 Amsterdam; June 18, 2008

The train from Haarlem to Amsterdam sped through the countryside and in 20 minutes we were right in the center of Amsterdam. Trains are quick and cheap--cost us €6.80 for a round-trip ticket. It's amazing to me how much countryside there is here. There really are no suburbs. I guess that's because everybody lives in apartments, and nobody has a house and a yard and a 2-car garage! All the countryside is flat polderland, which means it was reclaimed from the sea. There are small canals everywhere, still providing drainage.
Amsterdam is called "The Venice of the North" because it has hundreds of canals, which circle the city in concentric rings. We walked down the main streets and over the canal bridges, sharing the road with streetcars and a few autos. There's every kind of shop you can imagine, from Esprit and H & M to coffee shops which sell legal marijuana. (We didn't buy any.)
Then we found a cool little place almost like a hidden convent, called the Beguinnenhof(sp?). It's not really a convent because the women have never taken vows, but the ladies have been known for their good works. It's been a residence for widows and poor women for hundreds of years. It has lovely apartments surrounding a central courtyard, the city's oldest wooden house, a Catholic church and a Protestant church. The pilgrims who came to America on the Mayflower actually stopped here on their way and prayed ïn the Protestant church, because they were in such a hurry to flee persecutions in England.
We wandered for hours, with Shelley leading the way, since she was here last year. You see we found the flower market, of course!
We took a lovely canal boat ride that circled the inner city on the Herrengracht (one of the main canals) and then out toward the harbor and back. The weather held, though skies were grey. It was quite a pleasant rest for our feet!
After awhile we stopped at the Leidesplein, which is a big town square lined with restaurants and shops, and sat at an outdoor table. Of course, here came the waiter asking what we wanted to order. You can't just sit at their tables without ordering! So we each had a soda and another rest for the tired feet. I remembered how I used to really like European orange Fanta, so I had one. It looks like lemonade and is quite mild. Delicious!
I wanted to see the Van Gogh Museum, so we walked there too and got in for the last 45 minutes it was open. I was really thrilled to see so many originals I have seen before in books.
By 6:00 we were really tired from walking all day. We took take the tram back to the Centraal Station, (yes that is the correct Dutch spelling) and in a few minutes we were boarding the train, and 20 minutes later we were back in our town of Haarlem. Then came the walk back to the hotel on the main square, which is about 1/2 a mile away. We got back to the room and just crashed for a few minutes.
We are still chasing problems with our VISA cards. Seems they are set up here to take money from our savings, not our checking accounts.
Tonight there is a huge concert in the square outside our hotel. They've been setting up for 2 days. There's a big canopy over a large stage and a huge sound system. It looks like a rock concert, but when we were just there, someone was playing country music on the stage and only a few people were standing around. It looks really strange to me, because the rock concert is set up in the middle of the medieval square, surrounded by 500-year-old buildings! It's still early, only about 8:00. Last night it didn't get dark until almost 11:00, because we are so far north. I think they expect a lot more people, from the bathrooms they brought in on a truck!