May 3, 2008

This morning, we thought we'd grab a MacDonald's breakfast downstairs, however, they weren't open yet. Darn, I was soooo looking forward to an egg mcmuffin... NOT! Since it was closed we got on the road, figuring we'd find something along the way. Sure enough, not 15 min later, as we were driving down the freeway, we saw a service center coming up. We pulled off and found a really nice restaurant over top of the freeway! We also found a better road map for Jan to use, as the one we'd bought in Canada was big and had to be folded/unfolded constantly. Not really recommended for car use. The new one is much more easy to use, with page references, and everything.

We headed north through Belgium, into Germany for a while, and eventually into Holland. As you can see, I only got up to half the speed of the train! hahaha. I love driving on the roads over here, cruising at 130 and not even feeling like I'm moving, however, I constantly have to be watching my mirrors for the next Mercedes, BMW, or Porche, catching me like I was standing still (at 130???). The freeways criss-cross each other all over the place, some 2 lanes wide, while others can be 6 wide. We've seen windmills, and canals, and old churches.


We stopped in Enschede, and wandered around the center of town for a while, even going to a mall. There is a really neat pedestrian only area, that is wall to wall restaurants/pubs. There are bicycles everywhere. In Holland they even have special lights for bicycles also, not just cars and pedestrians.







We got to Amsterdam, in the afternoon, and blondie took us over a circuitous route right to a hotel, on a canal, where we found a parking spot right outside the front door! We went in to see if they had a room for the night. Sure enough, they did, with internet. The price, however, put us off. $285, Euro for the night! We mentioned Rick Steeves, and they knocked it down to 260 Euro, plus 32 Euro for parking until noon the next day, and Internet for 8 Euro. OUCH! That's close to $480.00 CDN. We decided that we could stay for 4 or 5 nights, at cheaper locations, so we thanked them very much and left, moments before the traffic warden came by to give us a ticket. The crowds and bikes everywhere were, pretty thick, and the lack of space, especially for parking, really puts the crimp in a tourist's plans. The guy at the hotel we turned down, said we could park out of town and take a tram in, but that would have been something like 7.50 Euro plus 5 to 10 Euro each for the tram, so we felt we'd just take some pictures as we left Amsterdam, and we'll see more of Holland tomorrow.

Earlier in the day we'd seen some hotels along the freeway, so felt we could continue on and find another one. We headed off toward Bruges, and did find another nice one, in a place called Meerkerk. It was a nice restaurant/bar and a cafeteria/buffet as well. We turned down their offer of breakfast at 12.50 Euro, each and will probably do like today, in the morning. The canals in Amsterdam were nice, but once you've seen a canal, or 20, what's the big deal?