I don’t think we wasted a moment of our time in Amsterdam. Our Hotel was in the most central location possible and when we weren’t chasing down an activity we were wandering through the lively streets, alleys and cannel’s of old Amsterdam. Just walking about is great entertainment in this city and absorbing all the activity and beauty becomes a challenge in itself. We did take-in a few choice activities that all turned out to be well worth the time commitment. We spent the better part of a day going through the famous “Rijks Museum” and actually coming close to doing justice to about sixty percent of it. We took a trip to the “Keukenhof” gardens that’s open only during the tulip season and it truly is a large and magnificent display of tulip flowers. Our cannel boat trip was fun, educational, and a great way to spend some time on a rainy day. Anne Frank’s house turned out to be a surprise for me. First, just getting in was a challenge, unless you really like standing in long lines. We went during the dinner hour and the lineup was somewhat reduced. It truly is a remarkable story of courage and strength and it does take on a stronger sense of reality when standing in the secret rooms where Anne wrote her diary and this family hid from the Nazi’s for two years. One of my favourite activities was the early morning trip we took to the amazing 100 year old “FloraHolland” flower market. This is the largest flower auction on earth and it supplies much of the world with fresh flowers 365 days a year. It’s massive and looking down on the huge and efficient shipping and receiving operation reminded me of watching worker ants with important missions scurrying about on an ant hill. If the buyer and seller are at opposite ends of the complex, a 15 kilometre overhead conveyer delivers the large flower wagons for them. Can’t imagine what the day before Mother’s Day would look like in this place. The red light district was also impressive and entertaining in a different kind of way, but I’ll leave that one to your imagination. Bicycles, bicycles and more bicycles. Bicycle parades! Everyone seems to ride bikes and use public transportation which gets you anywhere quickly and efficiently. Unless you mess-up. When returning to our campground we got off the train with our big bags and asked a very nice bus driver for instructions. Trying to be helpful, he dropped us off at a golf course that we tried to describe to him. The problem was, there were two golf courses in the area. Of course it was the wrong one and now we found ourselves quite a distance away from “home” without any further bus services for the night. Not many people were still around the club but two young golfers spotted us and when they realized our predicament, without hesitation, they offered us a ride. With golf clubs and travel bags packed to the roof we all squeezed into their small car and they drove us all the way to our campground where they wouldn’t even consider compensation for their efforts, Real gentlemen, and for some reason, they made us think of Cam.