Visit Amsterdam! Top 10 Things To Do (aside from avoiding being knocked down by a bicycle)

Last Summer we jetted off to Amsterdam for a long weekend. Himself had been before and I hadn't, so as usual, I let him get down to the planning while I searched Pinterest for "Miffy, Amsterdam" (more of that later). 

Amsterdam is a beautiful city. I'd happily go back there again at any time of year but it was in the 20's when we were there and the sun definitely makes it even more aesthetically pleasing. There's also just a really good vibe there, it's one of the few European cities that I'd actually really want to live in long term. You'll find that English is widely spoken, it's very easy to get around thanks to the tram and bus services and it's no more expensive to eat out/drink than Dublin. But back to my top 10. I always think it's easier to do it this way because otherwise I'll just harp on incoherently about how much I love the place.

In no particular order:

1. Gorge Yourself on Art!

Specifically here, I'm referring to the Van Gogh museum and the Rijksmuseum. 

In the Van Gogh museum you'll find the world's largest collection of his masterpieces, which are arrayed chronologically so you can start where he started and work your way through. You'll find there's specific limited edition exhibitions on throughout the year too. From March to June of this year for example, they have "Prints in Paris 1900", which includes Le Chat Noir and posters from the Moulin Rouge, which sounds fab! Book your ticket in advance HERE to save you queueing! 

Miffy Van Gogh, I mean, CAN YOU EVEN?!! 

The Rijksmuseum, meanwhile, has a whole host of artists under it's roof and you could easily spend an entire day here. If you're a fan of Rembrandt and Vermeer but you also like to mix it up with contemporary art, furniture, fashion and sculpture then you, my friend are in the correct place. 

Vermeer and YSL. Just an example of the wide range of art on offer here. 

Outside the Rijksmuseum, you'll also find one of the massive IAmsterdam signs to pose in front of, if you can beat other tourists out of the way first. These are in other places about the city, but a word of warning- everywhere will be jammers!

2. The Anne Frank House

If you've read Anne Frank's diary, then you'll want to visit the secret annex where she lived with her family and a few others during WW2 in order to escape Nazi occupied Holland. Having re-read the book a few times, it felt surreal and frankly, quite emotional to stand where she stood and to see everything just as she described it. I would highly recommend a visit here but would caution you to queue either late in the evening or very early in the morning. While we were there, there was always a massive queue, snaking around the block with people waiting to get in. Obviously only so many people can be accommodated inside at the one time but there seemed to be less people in the evening time and we started queueing around 9pm. They close at 10pm and open in the morning at 9am. You can buy your tickets online HERE but I'm not sure that makes a difference as you have to queue to get in either way. 

3. Shop The Nine Streets

This is a specific area of Amsterdam, featuring, you guessed it, nine streets, or De 9 Straatjes. Here you'll find a massive array of very lovely small shops, stocking everything from jewellery, trinkets, funky socks, vintage clothes, beauty products, cheese, art, gifts and of course, there's lots of cafes, bars and restaurants too. Even if you're just window shopping, strolling through the nine streets is a really pleasant way to while away an afternoon.

My favourite of all the shops. I bought a couple of those cutesy little fruit/moon/star lights in the window and a load of very cute postcards. Sorry to that poor woman, also in the window who is now forever on my blog.

4. Take a Canal Tour.

You can get around the city any which way you want, as I mentioned already, we did use the tram a lot and we walked a huge amount so we had already seen a good bit but it's always nice to see a city from river/canal level. You'll find there's a good few companies to choose from, several of which are down the street from the Anne Frank House.

5. Kookt Festival

This is a massive food and music festival that takes place throughout the Summer in Amsterdam. It moves location so your best bet is to check the different venues and dates on their Facebook page HERE. We went here our first night and we loved it. Such a great atmosphere, delicious food, drinks and brilliant music. 

Ha. Meating Point. Get it? Cause of ALL the BBQ meat. Himself was in heaven. There he is in a hammock. That part above him there is a mini beach. We sat out and had dinner and drinks while the sun went down. Lovely. Then we ate lots of food, including some unreal churros. Nom. 

6. Take a Stroll Through the Vondelpark.

The Vondelpark is the largest park in the city. You can do a bike tour or you can just take your time and walk through, stopping to look at the sculptures throughout or go directly to the open air theatre which shows music and dance performances during the Summer. When we were there, there was a reggae show on so we got some drinks from the bar and chilled out in the sun. Lovely!

Chilled wine in 24 degree heat + David Meowie tee = happy Chloe.

7. De Hallen Market

This is a converted industrial building in what's known as the trendy part of Amsterdam. Inside you'll find a massive indoor food hall, selling everything from sushi to burgers with bars and whole stalls dedicated to cake in between. There's also some stores, stocking; vintage clothes, vinyl records, local art and sculptures and lots of very cool hipster type gifts. We didn't venture into the nine-screen art deco style cinema, purely from a time perspective but that looked cool too. 

8. Get a Beer And Sit Outside a Nice Bar

…and, people watch! Honestly, Amsterdam is just the loveliest place to sit outside and take it all in. If you can, order some Bitterballen too. These are little Dutch meat (usually chopped beef or veal) based snacks that are served with a mustard dip. Quite delicious with an ice cold beverage!

9. Get a Slice Of The Greatest Apple Pie in The Entire World.

I've tried and have loved many's the apple pie. In fact, when I told my sister that this was the best she reminded me of the apple tart from the Bunratty folk park (which is unreal) and I had to tell her that this was better. She's still sceptical but she's wrong!! My friend Colleen advised us to go to Winkel's, where we would probably have to queue for a table but that it'd be worth it. 

She was not wrong! There are raisins in it (the devil's own shrivelled snack) but they are easily picked out and then you're left with a buttery, crumbly pastry, perfectly sweetened apples, a hint of cinnamon and a whack of cream on the side. If I go back to Amsterdam for no other reason, it'll be for Winkel's apple pie alone. Come, drool with me. 

 10. Visit the Miffy Shop (optional)

There's also a Miffy museum, but it's a bit outside of the city and we didn't really have the time. I have a major love for the little Dutch rabbit, Miffy ever since I was a lttle'un. Obviously I'm still slightly obsessed but what better city to be in than the home of the miffster him/herself. 

It was a tough inner battle not to buy the nurse & doctor miffy's but the price tags put me off...

There's plenty of other Miffy merchandise to buy and that's the only attraction there really, except for the lifesize Miffy to pose with…

Tips!:

• So, you may have noticed that the red light district isn't among my top 10 things to do. For me, it's one of those tourist things to do that you wouldn't recommend but that people still do anyway. Like Temple Bar. It's not particularly fun or pleasant but there's no harm in strolling through to see what it's all about. 

It's completely packed with people on both sides of the canal, lots of garish lights, and obviously lots of women in windows. Not high on my list.

• Buy a 4 day travel pass, these should be available in the train station. I can't remember how much this cost but we used this constantly on the trams and the buses, and it worked out to be really good value.

• I recommend stopping at Lot Sixty One for coffee- it is genuinely excellent coffee and people seem to flock to it.

• Food recommendations! Mook pancakes are wonderful and very filling. Start with a savoury and finish with a dessert pancake.

That's bacon, cheese, onion and maple syrup on the left and strawberries, blueberries, chocolate and coconut on the right. 

The waffles from the Metropolitan Deli are also well loved; you can get whatever toppings you want, so we got fruit and ice cream. You can also get poffertjes; little Dutch pancakes. That's them being made on the left. They are a thing of wonder. We got them covered with milk and white chocolate (behind the waffle). 

We also had a really good (non dessert) meal in Mata Hari, a restaurant near to the red light district. Excellent cocktails too (that's a rather lethal Long Island Iced Tea).

And that's that! Get yourself to Amsterdam, you won't regret it! 

Have you been to Amsterdam?

Where's next on your travel wish list? 

Enable me!

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Christmas in Bruges!

At the start of December, we jetted off to Brussels for a weekend of festive fun. We stayed there from a Thursday night to a Sunday morning and did every possible touristy thing we could, including their very large Christmas market. While we enjoyed that, we both felt the day we spent in Medieval Bruges (only an hour by train from Brussels) was, although smaller, more special and more atmospheric. 

The Christmas market by night

The town is only a short stroll from the train station and although you can hire a horse and cart, it's an absolutely beautiful place to walk around. In fact, I think the word picturesque may well have been coined with Bruges in mind. 

Pretty idyllic, eh? The streets themselves are suitably old-school and a joy to walk through. All of the chocolate shops in Belgium seem to be located right here and yes, we did buy much chocolate-y treats. 

By the time we'd walked through the streets of Bruges and got to the main square where the market was on, the sun was about to set and it looked even more Disney-esque than before:

There was also a relatively small ice-skating rink, which we didn't partake in cause I'm clumsy AF and manage to injure myself in my sleep, so instead we got alcoholic hot beverages and watched others enjoy the winter wonderland-ness of it all:

And of course, it's beautiful by nighttime:

Above is the tower featured in the Colin Farrell movie, In Bruges, that (SPOILER-the film is really old so it's your own fault if you haven't seen it and this spoils it for you) Brendan Gleeson falls to his death from. Again, SPOILER. 

You can pay to go to the top but it involves many steep and windy stairs, so we gave it a miss.

There's lots of arts and crafts, gifts, knitted hats and scarves, Christmas tree decorations etc to buy but personally I'm all about the gluhwein, hotdogs, frites and churros and they were there in abundance. 

The Bruges Christmas market is running until the 1st of January this year, if you've any days free between now and then and are super keen to go travelling!

Have you been to Bruges? 

Is it on your travel hit-list?

To the comments!

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New England Road Trip: Salem.

I am at last getting around to blogging about this part of our New England road trip (read more of that HERE). It's been a year now as we were there in September and October of 2015 but sure better late than never. I mostly wanted to keep Salem til now as it's coming up to Halloween and is the perfect time to reflect on our experience there. You should know in advance that I am a major lover of all things Autumn and Halloween so this was basically Chloe heaven. America is big on Halloween at the best of times and Salem was like that but on speed. And we were there two weeks before the actual event itself so that should tell you something. 

Where To Stay

Really, you can stay wherever you like as there's plenty of options but we stayed in a fab B&B that I felt was worth sharing. The owners of The Stepping Stone Inn were so friendly and really helpful when it came to advising us on where to eat and what tour to go on etc. Plus we loved the historical house and the decor was very cool. 

It was also really close to the centre of town so we were able to walk everywhere, which was super handy.

Where To Eat

We found a great deli that do the best sandwiches. We stopped into Scratch Kitchen on our last day for lunch and were served bacon dusted popcorn (amazing) while we waited for our Reuben's. Well worth a stop in!

Where To Shop

Salem is a beautiful place to walk around and window shop. There's lots of great book stores, tourist gift shops and witch/Hocus Pocus related stops plus, street stalls! 

I particularly loved a vintage style shop, Modern Millie, where I fell hard for the Dickens book clutch (below), that I sadly had no room for in my suitcase. There were also lots of cool 50's style dresses. Swoon. 

Bewitched In Salem is a good shop to go to for all things spooky; horror books, t-shirts, post cards, collectibles, figurines etc. Our tour also left from this spot, see more of that below. 

What Tour To Go On (cause you NEED to do a tour. Salem is history central).

Right. So there's loads of tours you can do but the Bewitched In Salem tour is widely considered to be the best and most historically accurate. Our tour guide started by saying that there would be no amateur dramatics because the real history of the town and the Salem witch trials were scarier than anything you could make up and he was so right. 

He took us through exactly what happened and brought us to all of the places where these horrific events took place. The tour was at night which added to the atmosphere but was chilly, so wear layers and wrap up! It's also worth booking in advance for this because it tends to get full up fast. 

We went back the following day to see the graveyard as it's illegal to go in there at night.

Our guide had told us which gravestones to look out for, including the worst judge of all that ordered the most amount of executions. Scary stuff. A lot of it was quite sad too so be prepared to feel a bit shaken after it.

This is the Salem monument to the victims of the witch trials; all of the stones around the green represent a victim and how they were killed. 

If you're wondering what "pressed to death" involves, just know that it's extremely grim. 

On a much lighter note, there's different Halloween events on every year with lots of delicious food stalls and fun things to do, like making a show of ourselves:

Then there's the specific witch related popular culture things to do, like visiting shoot locations from Hocus Pocus (the town hall where they filmed the enchanted all-night Halloween party for example, below) and the Samantha from Bewitched statue. It's illegal to not stand beside it and pose like a fool. No, really. Start practising your nose twitch now.

Salem was one of my favourite stops on our trip. We were only there for one night but we made the most of it and did as much as we could and cause of that, we got a really good feel for the place. I'd go back in a heartbeat. It was a really atmospheric place and that aside, it's also a very aesthetically pleasing town with lots to see and do. It's one hell of a history lesson to get too! 

Have you been to Salem? 

Where's next on your travel lust list?!

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Iceland; My Top Ten Things To Do!

In April we ticked off a major item in our bucket list; a trip to Iceland. Because it's such a unique and beautiful country, it's a good idea to plan in advance what you want to do. It's lucky for me then that I'm married to the world's biggest planner because we literally saw everything there is to be seen.

I'm limiting this to my top ten with some tips at the end for brevity's sake; otherwise we'd be here all year!

Reykjavik

The Blue Lagoon

We were concerned before we went to the Blue Lagoon that it would be a tourist trap but we really loved it. It's a geothermal spa and is considered one of the 25 wonders of the world. You should pre-book tickets to save disappointment and there's four options; standard, comfort, premium and luxury. We went for the comfort package which included entrance to the lagoon, a silica mud mask while you relax in the water, a free drink of your choice, an algae face mask and a towel when you get out. I can honestly say it was one of the most relaxing and enjoyable experiences ever. Sipping Prosecco while wearing a cleansing mask followed by a moisturising mask and all the time floating about in lovely warm, soothing water is the very best. It's worth every penny. We felt so refreshed after it (except that himself's shoes were stolen in the changing rooms but that's another story). The Comfort package is €65 each. 

Reykjavik Cathedral

This is a must see. Obviously the building itself is beautiful but inside, it's so peaceful and sparsely decorated. No gilding the lily for Iceland, that's for sure! Entry is free but you can pay €6 to get the lift to the top where you can see stunning views of all of Reykjavik (that's the photo at the very start).

Walk around Reykjavik

I always say that the best way to get to know a city is to walk around and see it from ground level. Reykjavik isn't huge either so you'll get a feel for the place pretty quickly. There's lots of tourist shops to pick up gifts for home but they are all quite pricey! There's also lots of very cute and interesting little clothes/homeware spots and plenty of quirky coffee places etc. It's a very colourful, lively city.

Harpa Building

The Harpa is near the docklands in Reykjavik and is a concert hall/conference centre. It's an architecturally stunning building and is more than a little surreal from the inside looking out. You can pay for a tour of the building which we didn't do but we did pay in to a David Bowie photography exhibition, which was very cool. I think Bowie would've been happy to have his portrait hanging in such a bizarrely beautiful building. 

The Northern Lights

I don't have a photo of this for one very good reason- we didn't bring the correct lens for the camera so our trusty Canon couldn't actually pick up the Lights, which is really annoying. But yes, they are beautiful. We actually saw them on our first night there, which was super handy because it meant we didn't have to stay up any other night after that in the cold! I know there are tours that will bring you out in the hopes of seeing them but I can imagine that would be costly and has a strong risk of being unsuccessful. We had rented a car so were quite free from that perspective. It is kind of the quintessential thing to do/see while you're in Iceland but it's a good idea to go into it without getting all your hopes up! Tips below on how to catch them!

Jökulsárlón Glacier Lagoon

Yeah, that's right, giant blocks of ice cracking and breaking away from each other on the lagoon, then floating out to sea. The bottom photo is of more blocks of ice that were washed up onto the beach. It was surprisingly warm that day so we were just wandering around beside all this ice but sweltering in our fleeces! We could've spent all day there, it was such a striking place.

Black Sand Beach, Vik.

I think the photos speak for themselves, but to emphasise it; I haven't used a filter, it's actually that monochromatic in real life. Black and white everywhere as far as the eye can see. Again, surreally beautiful. Like so many places in Iceland, we were in awe. 

Gulfoss Waterfall

Iceland is well known for its impressive waterfalls but I'm including this particular one because it's often mentioned alongside Niagara for it's scale. It's certainly worth a visit but the wind was bitingly cold that day so I didn't get too close! Beautiful though.

Thingvellir National Park

If you're into your history and like to know the roots of the places you visit, a trip to Thingvellir National Park is the place for you. This is where the first Icelandic parliament was originally founded in 930 and remained up til 1798. That big ridge of rock you can see there is the tectonic plate boundaries of the mid Atlantic ridge. So…not something you see very day. We walked the full park and there's plenty to see as you go around, lots of photo opportunities!

Geysir Hot Springs

This is more of the geothermal water that Iceland is famous for. Deep down in the geysir, the water temperature is 125 degrees Celsius so you can imagine the pressure form all of that seriously boiling water- it's not gonna stay down there for long. Obviously stay well back and enjoy it from a safe distance! It goes off every few minutes to much hand clapping from surrounding tourists, which is understandable because it is very impressive!

Top tips!

• Be prepared for how expensive everything is. Having been to Norway before, we expected similar pricing and so we weren't surprised to see the locals buying their alcohol in the duty free when we landed, as we had seen the same in Oslo. We didn't pick up anything in the airport but it's not a bad idea to do so. We ended up stopping off at a supermarket for some craft beers and a bottle of wine that was much the same price as the airport so it hardly makes that much difference. You'll really notice the price hike when ordering a beer or a glass of wine in a restaurant, however so we ended up mostly not drinking with our meals. If you can, it's a good idea to pack a lunch for a day out and have plenty of snacks like fresh fruit with you- all available in the supermarkets, of course. Otherwise you end up eating a lot of junk food.
• Outside of Reykjavik, I could not find a decent cup of coffee for love nor money. I chanced one of the coffee machines that are at regular stops but it was vile. Save your cash and keep the memory of what coffee is supposed to be like in your mind (I'm only half joking there to be honest). Below is the delicious cup I had in Reykjavik. That cookie was good too..

• Food wise, you'll find that fish and lamb dishes tend to be the specialities. I don't eat lamb but himself enjoyed all the lamb that he tried while I revelled in big hearty bowls of fish soup after being out in the biting winds. The fish soup is kind of like a chowder, and I also had an amazing fish gratin that I'm still thinking about…We were advised by an Icelandic person not to eat whale- it's often listed on menus as a speciality but the locals frown upon it and would never eat it themselves, it's just a gimmick for tourists (a gimmick that involves killing whales). 

• We stayed in Skuggi Hotel in Reykjavik which was pretty reasonably priced, nicely decorated with friendly staff and it was centrally located but there's always Airbnb if you'd prefer your own space. When we checked in we got a booklet of discount vouchers which meant that I got 30% off my Icelandic woollen jumper! Score!

• So, the Northern Lights. You're more likely to see them at the start and at the end of the year. They're generally visible up until May but not after that so plan your dates accordingly. We went in April so I think we were just lucky really. You need a clear, dark sky and the locals should be able to tell you whereabouts they normally appear. Wrap up super warm (layers are your friend! I'm going to do a separate post on what to pack) and for the love of god, bring the right camera lens! There's also an online site that provides regular updates on the weather changes in Iceland (of which there are many) and that will give a better idea of your chances of seeing them. 
• If you're renting a car, be aware of potential add ons to the insurance when you arrive to collect it. When we got there they freaked us out completely about driving conditions- the risk of sand storms/grit storms/super strong winds that can pull your car door off etc. Basically, just drive carefully and keep an eye on that weather site I've linked in the previous bullet point.

And a waterfall rainbow for good measure!

Have you been to Iceland?

Any plans to go?

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