Uff da!
Today was our first full day of touring but far from our first 'strenuous'day, which by definition of the tour description is 6-10 miles. We've reached the 6 mile mark on every day but the first, and today we actually logged 8.7 miles! 22949 steps, which you know I'm going to try to make an even 23K before I go to bed!
I'm SO glad we decided to do a tour instead of theoretically saving money by doing it all ourself. I'm delighted that I don't have to figure everything out, and there are definately perks to going with this tour group. We were the first people into the Anne Frank house when it opened this morning at 9AM, and you should have seen the lines waiting to get in!
It was incredible just how small of a space they were crammed in. As one man said, A living prision" The furniture is out of the rooms but the pictures Anne put up on the walls were still there.
From there we saw the Westerkerk, which is where Rembrandt is buried, and then we took a walking tour and then lemme see, it's all running together! We ate lunch high in a restaurant overlooking the rooftops of Amsterdam. I had a sandwich and a pannekoeken (special pancake that's wrapped over a few scoops if ice cream and whipped cream). We hopped a tram and went to the Rijksmuseum, where I actually was able to appreciate art!! It was great!
After that, we wandered around and then headed off on another long walk for our much needed rest, which was an hour and a half long cruise along the canals. That was super cool and some tour members even fell asleep!
We finished up our time in Amsterdam by walking through the Red Light District and then headed back on the train to Haarlem for our final night here.
I've really enjoyed the Netherlands and can't wait for all we will see in the rest of the countries!