Our trip started out with a whizz and a bang - a few drinks at the airport (after the most annoying security check - never have I had such strict liquid rules enforced) and Jess, Nigel and I were on board our flight to Eindhoven. Nigel was in the seat in front of us, and it was something he was glad of by the end of the flight.
Jess, The Colonel and I hanging out
Food at Nomads
The flight.
It all started with our lovely flight attendant Patricia, a fiery rude witch in dire need of an attitude adjustment and sense of humour. Jess had reserved seats on the flight, and as we were sitting down on them, she was instructing us to move, without even acknowledging Jess explaining that they were ours. Looking flustered and pissed off, she moved elsewhere on the plane inflicting her lack of humor or personality on other poor unsuspecting passengers. We made friends with Frank, the guy sitting in the aisle seat and we were set for our flight. The plane started moving, and as it did, the light caught Jess's bracelet which had little mirrors over it - causing it to project light around the plane around us. Jess, getting excited to show me this, exclaimed "Look! My bracelet is little a disco ball", but she was holding her arm out of the sun when she was showing me. I laughed and moved her bracelet in to the sun and we giggled away to ourselves at the pretty lights darting around the plane. Well, what a mistake this was. The evil daggers started beaming at us from Patricia's eyes, and she continued the safety demonstration with a sour pout stuck on her face and a little angry vein sticking out of her forehead. Next minute, the safety demonstration is over, and she is standing at our aisle, cheeks flushed red and steam almost coming out of her ears. I can't remember the whole "telling off" entirely, but it went along the lines of this is a very serious matter, we need to know what to do in an emergency (to which we started reciting the safety rules back to her, in perfect order), said that they are not clowns and there for our entertainment and that if Jess did not apologise, there would be police waiting for us at Amsterdam when we landed. At this point, Frank interjected excitedly "Are we going to Amsterdam!! Cool, saves us catching the train to there from Eindhoven". This sent Patricia in to another one of her charming rages, said no, they would be waiting in Eindhoven which she will go and call ahead right now if we did not all apologise. Not wanting to end up in jail, we reluctantly apologised, and made sure we sat up straight, with our arms crossed not saying a word or laughing when she walked past us. When the all so charming Patricia was not shooting us dirty looks, we entertained ourselves on our 45 minute flight by having Heinekens' and making paper planes and the "pick a number" origami game.
Someone dropped their mixed herbs on the street
After a short bus and hour and a half train we were finally in Amsterdam (luckily there were no police at the airport - Patricia you joker!!). The first thing that I noticed were the millions of bicycles! They were everywhere - parked all over the sidewalks and almost running you down whether you were crossing the road or walking down the footpath. While we were walking down the to the hotel, Jess stood on a bag of what looked like some sort of mixed herbs. What an odd thing to find on the streets of Amsterdam! We walked to where we were staying at NH City Centre Hotel and quickly got ready for our 9.30pm dinner booking. We passed some of our group (there were around 20 of us all there for the weekend) and they went ahead to Nomads to get our reservation as it was 9.30pm, and we were very behind schedule. Jess and I had a very nice room - safe to say the biggest and best out of all of the rooms our group had, which we managed to keep a secret from everyone so this was not the room we all drank in after dinner. The restaurant was middle eastern, and we all sat on a bed of cushions and ate massive trays of delicious food (which there was way too much of) and got to meet most of the other people that were there joining us. Jess managed to knock one of the trays full of drinks over behind her, just missing the people that were sitting on the seats. Oops! Before we knew it, the place had cleared out and we were the only ones left in there apart from the staff and it was almost 3am, and we had missed the prime time of the red light district and a lot of the cafes. Since there was not much else to do we went back to the hotel and had a few drinks before Jess and I snuck off to bed so we could get some sleep before our sight-seeing.
Dinner at Nomads
Me at the canals
Jess outside Van Gogh
The line for the Anne Frank Museum - Jess looking for the Anne Frank Museum on the map
It's safe to say we aimed high with our expectations of sight-seeing, and came in a little below average at what we achieved. By the time we were up and ready it was almost 10.30am, so we went over to see Anne and have a coffee in the attic with her. The line was massive, and did not seem to be moving fast (and the wind coming down the canal was freezing), so we got out the tourist map and decided where we were off to next. The Van Gogh Museum did not seem too far away so we made our way there. Here there was also a line, but we waited it out and got in after 20 minutes. Jess and I walked around and admired all of the artwork (but did not stand there gazing at each one for half an hour like most cultured people do), then went to meet the rest of the crew back at the hotel. We went to the Pancake Bakery and pondered the menu for half an hour deciding what on earth we were going to order. Jess and I decided we'd get one sweet and one savoury and share. Like most places we'd been too in Amsterdam the service was great (insert sarcasm here) and eventually we were given our food. By the time we'd eaten it was 2.30pm and we did not have time to visit the Heineken Experience like planned, so we went back to the hotel, got our group together and headed to Den Bosch so we could get ready for A State of Trance 550 hosted by Armin van Buuren - a massive trance music festival where 50,000 people were expected.
ASOT 550
We arrived in Den Bosch to be guided to the hotel by Omar. We had discovered the night before that Omar wasn't the best at navigating and was very fond of walking around in circles. This got put in to practice in the courtyard out the front of the train station as we literally walked a huge circle while he determined which way his phone was saying to go. After a few circles and much debate we made it on to the street, walked the wrong way a couple of times and then finally asked a taxi driver which way to go - sensible option. We finally made it to the hotel (thanks to the taxi driver, not Omar) and got ready in our very pretty suite at the Golden Tulip, and started drinking with more and more people arriving by the minute. With the crew all ready to go around 9pm, we taxied to the festival and got ready to party! Such a fun night, with amazing performances by everyone that I saw - even though I did lose Jess an hour in to it, and didn't see her again until 7.30am (clever me left my phone at the hotel). The main stage that we were first in managed to get full when I went for a walk without Jess, so I couldn't get back in to find her. One of the best things about being in such a big group though, there were always lots of people with me even if my bestie wasn't next to me! Everyone eventually made their way back to the hotel and had more drinks, and at about 9.30am I decided I best have a nap before we started our journey back to London.
Pancakes from Pancake Bakery
The tone on the flight was a lot different than our flight over, Jess and I both feeling extremely sorry for ourselves. We well and truly left Amsterdamaged.
Even though I didn't get to see a lot of things that I wanted to in Amsterdam, it conveniently gives me an excuse to go back there! Thanks everyone for such a great weekend.
