Amsterdam

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

The pictures are:
Arriving down the canal at daybreak
The palace of the Queen
We took a petal cab again
One of many canals in the city
Fireboat salute upon leaving

For the first time on the trip, we awoke to sunshine. That’s true; we have not had a morning with sunshine all trip. As a matter of fact, we probably have only had a few hours of total sunshine all trip, up until today.

But, we have not had any rain and it has not been cold so we are very thankful for a great trip with good weather.

The ship passed into the city through the locks before 7:00am so we were not up to see it. It took until 9:30am before the ship finally made it to the city docks and we were allowed off the ship.

Our first impression was not very good, but as we traveled the streets we liked the city more and more we came to enjoy the city. We spent 3 ½ hours on a walking trip seeing the sights of the city. “Grass” and prostitution are legal and so it was a rather strange walk through the city especially seeing the red light district and the “coffee houses” which were places where you could buy drugs – and they were everywhere.

We then walked around on our own until it was time to walk back to the ship. After getting on the ship at 5:00pm, we ate pizza on our deck as we watched the rest of the passenger’s board. At 6:00pm we sailed away to a fireboat with its water cannons blazing!

Tonight is our last night so it will be sad leaving new friends but we will have great memories.

It took us until dinner time to pack and set the bags outside the door for pickup later in the evening.

We went to the casino and played for awhile and then said our goodbyes to the staff.

Setting the clock back for the last time – a perfect time to pick up an hour of sleep.



Tomorrow is a travel day and we are ready to be home. We are looking forward to seeing everyone and the next report will be in person.

Night, night.

Love - Barb and Ed