The day we arrived it was cold and windy and rainy and I loved it. The city that is. The weather I could do without. It reminded me a lot of winter in Seattle, but after growing accustomed to 65 and sunny I wasn't quite ready for it. Luckily the heavy rain lasted just one day and our only battle for the next two was against the cold and the occasional drizzle. I dealt with it by buying a hat and drinking lots and lots of coffee. There's few situations in this world that can't be improved by a warm beverage (or a beer).
The staircases in Amsterdam are equally as skinny as the houses and steep. This makes it hard to move furniture, so the Dutch developed a system to get big items in and out of the house. If you look closely there's a beam at the top of each house. They tie a rope on it and then haul their things up.
Weather aside, I really did fall in love with Amsterdam. With an average height of 6'1" the Dutch are the tallest people on Earth and at 5'9" I fit right in. It might be the only place where I've gone out at night at not felt like I towered over others. In fact, I felt like I could have gotten away with 4 inch stilettos. The Netherlands is also home to the most bikes per capita in the world with 16,652,800 people and 16,500,000 bicycles. We opted to be pedestrians the whole time, but I think it would have been fun to rent a bike for a day and get around the city like a local. Maybe next time.
If you do rent a bike be sure to lock it up. Our tour guide warned us that sometimes drunk locals get their kicks by throwing unlocked bikes into the canals.
As it was we had plenty of fun walking around, going on the Heineken brewery, taking a city tour, eating waffles and strolling through Vondel park. I loved seeing all of the skinny houses and the canals and going to the Anne Frank house. We had to wait in line for forty minutes in the wind and rain, but it was worth it. Being able to see what we've all read in her diary and learning more about it was an incredible experience and I would suggest it to anyone visiting Amsterdam.
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