wind mills and waffles

Readers,

This past weekend was my trip to Belgium, which in turn became a 3 day side trip to the Netherlands- meaning Amsterdam. Honestly not my favorite of the cities I've traveled to, but then again I've seen some extraordinary cities, and they can't all be uber-fabulous.

It all started with a plane ride to Brussels, then a bus to the actual city center, then we found ourselves at the train station looking at the board, saw a train to Amsterdam leaving in 8 minutes. JC inquired, "do you want to go?" I couldn't think of a reason to decline, so off we went toward Holland. We arrived in the rain to a shimmering city of neon.
We then proceeded to wander around for close to 4 hours, in search of an internet cafe and then a hostel.. Regardless, we finally found a place to lay our weary heads, though it seemed a shame to just pass out in a city as notorious as Amsterdam, so we went out for a beer or two. Before long, we found ourselves at a rather tawdry watering hole, complete with confederate flags and what appeared to be a band channeling Lynyrd Skynyrd. We didn't last there very long.. Did some more wandering, and before long ended up back at the hostel for some much needed sleep.

More aimless wandering the next day, this time mostly outside of the kitchy tourist center. Marveled at the timeless Dutch architechture, meandered through an open park, followed the lines of the canals, took a ferry to the north side across the port, tried to get some good shots.
JC decided he'd like to stay in Amsterdam the majority of our trip, especially considering some people from our program were due to arrive on Saturday. Being myself, I obliged- however, the girls never showed so we spent the majority of Saturday wandering yet again and spending far too many euros on Belgian frites and Heineken. Sometime during this day, my camera decided it would be prudent to crack along the edge of the screen and obscure 2/3 of the image. Which honestly wouldn't bother me much, except for the fact that it doesn't have a viewfinder so I have to aim and pray for a good shot. But I still ended up with some pretty nifty shots, so I suppose I needn't care too much.

Sunday we said our goodbyes to Amsterdam and made our way back to Brussels. Upon arriving, we saw another train to Bruges leaving in 11 minutes, and decided to spend the evening there, on JC's suggestion. So we boarded another train, and were off to another city. Bruges is a beautiful little tourist trap in the East of Belgium, in the West Flanders. It is a small city, of course paved in cobblestone and roofed in tile. We wandered, we ate waffles, we climbed towers, we ate mussels, we drank, we watched futbol in a local pub- we experienced most of what the city had to offer. I won't say that we got a local experience, as I doubt there are very many locals to begin with; but it was fun, and the food was exquisite.
The next day I took the reigns and said I'd like to see some of Brussels before we flew back to Prague that afternoon, so back on the rails we went. We only had 2 hours in the city, and somehow managed to wander without a map- this basically consisted of, "Well that building looks important, let's go that way." We found the city centre, another beautiful little Christmas market, got some waffles to go and were back at the train station in time to catch our bus to the airport.
It seemed a very long weekend, and I think it's safe to say I'm acutely joyous to be back home in Prague. Though I'm going to have to uproot and leave soon, back to another house and another home. Reverse culture-shock is a very real possibility.

Cheers,

Erin