Last night in Amsterdam

My last day in Amsterdam (for the first bit anyways), was a grand one, and deserving of its own blog post.

In the morning, Jenny and Lisa went off to campus to study, and I decided to stay home for a little bit to get some laundry done. The world's sneakiest pair of pink underwear somehow found their way into my mostly white wash...so that was great. My white teeshirt and blouse are no longer so white, but a strange pinky hue. Just ecstatic with that discovery, I set off to buy replacements, and also to get my hands on some Dutch toothpaste. I ended up finding some nice and relatively cheap teeshirts at the Hema, so I bought a white replacement tee and a black one as well. No luck on the blouse yet.

I took a good stroll through Amsterdam, with no goal in particular. It's such a beautiful city, aimlessly wandering is a perfectly acceptable activity. I met Lisa and Jenny, and Jenny's Scottish friend Becky back near Rembrant's House for lunch. We wanted to eat at this little black canal house place that we'd had our eye on for a while.

It turned out to be more a bar than a restaurant, but the view from their canalside patio made everything ok. I ate many cheese cubes, essentially their only g-free option. Lisa and Jenny split some Bitterballen, and since they're so authentically Dutch, I tried one despite the breading. If I could eat handfuls of them without the consequences, I totally would. Yum.

After our snack, I accompanied Lisa and Jenny back to their campus cafeteria where they were studying with Frank. About an hour later, Jenny graciously lent me her bike, and Lisa and I started what would be a most splendid of evenings.

Our bike ride across town to the Heineken Experience was a lovely one. We cycled along tree lined paths and across beautiful bridges, the canals glowing underneath in the setting sun. We managed to get some sweet action shots along the ride as well.

me and the bestie!

We first made the mistake of walking into the actual Heineken headquarters, and then arrived next door at the "experience" (they're very adamant it's not a museum).

It was neat to see how the family brewing business started, and to get a hands on look at how beer is brewed. We got to taste the malted barley and smell the hops pre-brewing, and then also tasted the weird sweet watery drink produced before hops is added in the process.

After walking through the brewing room (at the site of Heineken's first real brewery) we gathered round a bar with our fellow tourists and had a taste of the final result. Prost! We learned why the head on the beer is important, and how to properly slam it back. On our mostly empty stomachs, it was here that Lisa and I already began to feel slightly tipsy.

The next room was a chill lounge were you could sit back and watch Heineken commercials from a few different countries. The museum- sorry, "experience" was starting to shut down by then, so we were rushed through the final exhibits, but Lisa did get to fulfill her life long dream of DJing.

In the "international bar" we had about 5-10 minutes to finish the two free beers we each got with our ticket. We accomplished this with a very strategic round of "never have I ever". Then we rushed out of the building and across the bridge to catch the last canal ride going to the brand store.

On the Heineken Cruise

On this drunken cruise of ours, Lis and I kept the Heineken flowing in their new weird black light bottles. The ride took us as far as Lisa's place, where we were told there was no return trip. This would have been ok, except that our bikes were on the other end. No matter, we decided, and walked to the grocery store to buy a six pack of Heineken (why not, right?).

Back at Lisa's dorm, we "iced" Jenny (a strange ritual where you hide a Smirnoff Ice in someone's bag and upon finding it, they're made to get down on one knee and chug it) and convinced her to walk back to the HE with us to fetch the bikes, and then go out for dinner.

We polished off the 6 pack on the walk, again with the backwards version of never have I ever. The Heineken Headquarters received some sweet street art that night. At the bikes, Lisa and I confirmed that despite the fact we can't do it sober, we are excellent drunken double-bike-riders. Off we went in that fashion, and settled on having dinner at the Hardrock Café, cause Jenny had never been.

After more drinking, and eating, and splitting a delicious dessert, we three got back on the bikes and ended up heading into Museumplein. I got to take pictures with the famed "I Amsterdam" sign, so...check!

On the bike ride back home, I unfortunately started feeling queasy, so we had to postpone the rest of our plans for the evening, which involved a variation on our intoxication at a strange treehouse. I'm sure that moment will occur eventually.

I got quite sick that night- enough to consider rescheduling my flight to Copenhagen, which it was of course too late to do. Lisa shot up like a bolt at about 5AM with my same symptoms, so we've come to the conclusion that perhaps a contaminated grill at the Hardrock gave us a touch of food poisoning.

It wasn't easy to get up and head to the airport at 7:45 that morning, but somehow I managed. It ended off kind of brutally, but on the whole, t'was a night to remember.