Despite the overly dramatic title, today didn’t start out so great. Following the insanity of last night that I wrote about there was also a oddly constant barrage of random (what I can only assume to be) fireworks which seemed to go off every time I was just about to fall asleep. So this morning I woke up tired, not feeling great, and having an internal debate as to whether or not I was even going to join the rest of the group for the bus tour. Staying in bed seemed awfully appealing, but it seemed pretty stupid to come all this way to Iceland and not go see the sights outside of the  city.

We were scheduled to tour the “Golden Circle,” which basically is just a fancy name for the main sites you’re able to see in a day trip outside of Reykjavík. This involves seeing Þingvellir National Park, the Gullfoss waterfall, the geysey-laden Haukadalur, and finally the Blue Lagoon spa. As we pulled out at 9:00 AM it was still dark out, miserably cold, and an incredible wind melded with this horrifyingly cold rain that just felt like you were being blasted with some kind of freezing cold bird shot. The wind was blowing so hard that it was having a serious impact on the bus’s ability to keep driving straight.

Around an hour later and the sun started to come up and we arrived at Þingvellir. It still was stupid cold, windy, and rainy. We reluctantly got off the bus to check out the “scenic overlook” which basically involved running across a parking lot covered in ice and soon-to-be-frozen standing water, while being drenched with rain. The whole reason my finger is in the above shot is because the wind was blowing so hard I had to clutch my iPhone with both hands to not have it blow away. I snapped a photo, and ran back to the bus, not sure if this picture was worth my now soaked-through jeans, shoes, and socks.

I had another good hour of bus time to vaguely dry off, and stew in my own rain soaked clothes, on the way to Gullfoss- Still debating whether or not I should’ve just stayed in bed. Luckily, the weather broke almost instantly when we arrived which allowed us all to enjoy this amazing marvel of nature. What’s awesome about this waterfall, which is by far the largest waterfall I’ve ever seen, is that it’s apparently entirely sourced by glaciers melting.

It sort of makes you realize just how unfathomably large glaciers are, as they’re capable of producing such a large volume of water and still existing. We walked all over Gullfoss, which allowed for several great angles of viewing the waterfall including seeing deep down inside of the huge crevasse that all the water flows into before racing out.

These photos really don’t do it justice. The size, the sound, everything is just totally overwhelming. Also, apparently, if you go in the spring or summer you can walk down the path visible in the above photo which is sadly closed during the winter as the waterfall spray basically has it iced over 24/7. But, whatever. After seeing everything Gullfoss had to show us we walked up a winding set of stairs to a restaurant that overlooked the whole thing that specialized in traditional Icelandic meat soup which didn’t seem to have a more interesting name than that.

It was a basic thin soup of lamb, potatoes, carrots, onions, and some other unidentifiable starchy vegetable. It was pretty plain, but totally hit the spot, especially with how cold my feet (still) were from the initial soaking at Þingvellir. I made it rain at their gift shop, and once again we all piled back on to the bus to head to Haukadalur. I’ve never seen an actual geyser before, and was totally excited to see one that was active enough to go off every 5-10 minutes.

The park was loaded with these steaming volcanic pools, and it was incredible how they were all so different. Some were bubbling constantly, others flowed in and out, and then pools like the above one were so eerily still that you could see deep down into the system of caves that make the whole geyser system work.

The whole area smelled of sulfur, and while you couldn’t get close enough to put your hand in the actual pools, you could feel the runoff which was still almost too hot to touch. After walking around for a while, we took our positions at the Strokkur geyser for its scheduled explosion. A few moments later, and…

I’ve never seen anything like this before, it was awesome. What was hilarious about the whole thing though was that there were so many people essentially watching the geyser through their iPads as they shot video and/or photos. So, I had Jared take a photo of me taking a photo with my iPad like all the other idiots there.

We wandered around a bit more, and saw a few other miniature geysers, although none were anywhere near as impressive as Strokkur.

Surprisingly enough, Haukadalur terminates at yet another gift shop, which seemed to sell the exact same thing as the previous gift shop. Once again, back on the bus, we headed to the Blue Lagoon, which as I understand it is Iceland’s premiere spa location.

The water there is this weird milky blue while totally opaque. It apparently has all sorts of health benefits, but I was just interested in bathing in a volcanic pool, which is exactly what we did. It was a ridiculously cool experience, as the air outside was freezing cold (and even filled with rain and freezing rain at times) but the water was nice and warm. After an incredibly quick run from the locker rooms to the pool, Jared and I were bobbing around in style.

Our hair is all crazy because the minerals in the water almost instantly turns your hair totally stiff. We were warned about it, and decided it sounded too silly to not try. The mixture of the cold air and hot water was just fantastic, and we were really at a loss as to how the whole situation could be improved at all. That is, until we discovered that there also happens to be a bar that’s actually in the pool.

So, the answer to the question of “What could possibly make floating in the waters of the Blue Lagoon any better?” is, “Add beer and ice cream.”

I mean, of course, it only makes too much sense.

Today was a weird day. Jared and I are really only here to see Paradox’s mobile offerings, which we saw all of yesterday so as far as the actual convention was concerned there was absolutely nothing to do today. I “slept in” until around 9:00, went to go get breakfast, then came back to the room to write up all the things we saw here yesterday on TouchArcade:

• Live From the Paradox Con 2013
  
• PDXCON13: ‘Magicka – Wizards of the Square Tablet’ Hands-On Preview
• PDXCON13: ‘Leviathan Warships’ Hands-On Preview

The games we saw are really cool, although Paradox is happily parading down the same road I’ve seen so many developers go down where they’re basically just like, “Well our game are premium games, and as such should have a premium price,” while seemingly totally ignoring the current trend in mobile business models. Don’t get me wrong, I wish developers could sell video games for a few dollars on the App Store, but this just isn’t the world we live in. There’s no reason for someone to even spend two dollars on something, as chances are they’ve got dozens of games they downloaded for free that they haven’t even tried yet.

So, yeah, I’ve spent a lot of time here basically saying, “Hey these games are great but you really need to think about how you’re going to sell them.” Everything they’ve shown us has been games I’d like to see sequels of, and that requires the original doing well enough to justify it.

Jared and I then spent a few hours wandering around Reykjavík, but found that everything closed super early. I ended up buying a new beanie style winter hat from Iceland’s cleverly named 66° North brand of winter gear. It’s really nice, and features some kind of next-level anti-wind technology. Speaking of which, I’ve gotten really good at duplicating all the crazy ways people tie scarves in Europe.

Dinner was cool, and was at the top of this really tall building right on the convention front. It’s one of those places that just has windows instead of walls, and being really high up and seated right next to the window was really creepy as every time you looked out of the corner of your eye it felt like you were going to just fall out. The food that was served was some sort of swanky turkey concoction, served with a scotch that was way too rough for me to drink.

The first phase of the night was over around 9:00, and word spread that they had reserved the VIP room at this Icelandic club, but that didn’t start until 11:00. Jared and I decided to head back to the hotel to hang out at their top floor bar area, which serves a double purpose as a ultra-fancy hotel restaurant. When we arrived there were two couples having what seemed to be a nice quiet dinner overlooking the ocean and mountains.

…Then everyone else from the conference piled in looking for beers. I felt sort of bad, but, what can you do.

11:00 rolled around, and we headed over to this club. Jared and I were both pretty tired, so neither of us were into the whole VIP room bottle service thing- Especially as the DJ set up shop. So, we peaced out to find a venue a little more relaxed. …But, the problem was, Reykjavík at night is insane. If you would’ve asked me what I thought of the city as we were walking around this afternoon I would’ve been like “Aww it’s this quaint little arctic coastal town, it’s so cute!”

Yeah, not anymore. On the way to wherever we were going to go next we saw:

• People just breaking bottles in the street, because why not.
• A dude punching and kicking in a window of a random shop.
• People angrily yelling at each other in Icelandic from either side of the street.
• Some guy whose face was totally bloody just stumbling down the sidewalk.
• The associated crowd of angry guys who (presumably) were involved in said bloody face.

Reykjavík is not a big place, either! It’s not like we were walking for miles and miles and saw all this, I’m talking inside of like three blocks. This quickly invoked a, “Dude, we need to bounce back to the hotel, like, now.” …And that’s the first time I think I’ve ever felt like that while traveling. Definitely a weird sensation.

The main problem here is that guys are really (really) muscular, so while your typical angry drunk person may not seem that threatening, when you give them a typical viking build and muscles to make them look like they could basically kill you one handed… Yeah. I did, however, get lots of compliments on my light up shoes. So, personal victory there, I guess.

Oh, and to add to the crazy things I saw today list? Some obvious Asian tourists just, you know, literally walking on thin ice to have their photos taken. I was telling Jared, “Gah, this is the worst, as we’re now in a position to need to help these people when they fall in.” Thankfully, they didn’t, but, man, how stupid can you be?

Iceland has been awesome so far, although, while I thought my long days in Amsterdam were exhausting, they’ve got nothing on Iceland. Today I practically went full steam ahead from around 6:00 AM until finally getting back to the hotel at 1:00 AM. First off, let’s start with the view from my hotel, which as I mentioned previously, is just incredible.

Mountains and ocean to one side of me, and the convention center, the harbor, and the rest of Reykjavík to the other. It’s really hard to ask for better than this.

Today we met with a bunch of game producers and saw some upcoming titles from this Swedish “Grand Strategy” game development company, Paradox Interactive. It’s sort of a big deal that they’re getting involved in mobile, and showing off their games is the whole reason they invited us here. This conference is one of the most intimate I’ve been to, and the small handful of people has allowed us to do crazy things that we never would be able to do at, say, something the side of GDC.

The climax of the day was going to be a boat ride to Viðey, and the boat left at 7:00. It was actually sort of amusing because no one seemed to know anything about it short of “The boat leaves at 7:00.” It was a little concerning, but, whatever. I’ll go down with the ship.

The boat we were on was a whale watching ship during the day, so it featured tons of different platforms you could stand on as well as a (thankfully) heated and comfortable lower deck that we spent our time on. One thing that was vaguely concerning is that when you get on an airplane, they always go over the vague safety procedure. It’s so second nature that you barely even pay attention… But there was none of that here. I couldn’t even tell you where the life vests were.

The boat ride turned into a booze cruise fairly quickly as beers were passed out to anyone who didn’t have one in one (or both) of their hands, and someone kept floating about the lower deck with a tray of shots of the “Black Death” schnapps. I did one again today, and it was still just as terrible, if not more so, than the previous night. It came in two varieties, one a little more yellowish than the other, but I wasn’t sticking around to try both.

15 minutes or so later and we made it to the island of Viðey. Stepping off the boat we were greeted by the disemboweled corpse of a seagull, and no one could really decide if that was an omen or not. Regardless, we walked down this super long dock to head up to the building we were going to eat at. It’s called the Viðeyjarstofa and it’s the oldest stone building in Iceland.

You can’t really make it out very well in the photo since it was so dark, but before we could ascend the stairs to the restaurant we were held captive by vikings who were fighting with various weaponry ranging from different swords and axes. It was pretty amusing, as they’d take turns dying, before springing back up, and “killing” the other viking. They followed us up the hill, fighting the whole way.

The actual restaurant was super nice, and we ate in the upstairs area which had this incredible exposed roof. It was a fixed menu of Icelandic fair, paired with some really great wine. Afterwards, a “party” of sorts was held, which basically just consisted of white people dancing to the Black Eyed Peas. I was fairly exhausted and mentally checked out at this point, just waiting for the ferry to come back so I could go to sleep at the hotel when someone came in shouting about how the northern lights were outside.

We all grabbed out coats and filed out, and sure enough, bright as could be was all sorts of weird looking green wispy stuff in the sky. It was incredible, especially considering how much light pollution there was from the nearby city of Reykjavík. They were nice and bright from the opposite side of the restaurant which was shielded enough from the city lights that your eyes could adjust to see them all. I can totally see how people get those dramatic northern lights photos though, as I bet if you drove north just a little bit more to where you couldn’t see a single light around you they’d look ridiculous… Just like looking at stars.

The boat came back at midnight to shuttle us back to the hotel, and the rest of the night was uneventful aside from the fact that they docked us in a totally different location that was almost on the border of the European definition of a “long” walk. Or, at least, a “walk” that was amplified to “long” by just how cold it was out. This trip has been crazy so far, and I can’t wait to see what they have in store for us tomorrow and Saturday… As these outings are going to be really difficult to top.

Today was awesome, but backing up, I should cover what I didn’t write about yesterday as I had sort of resigned myself to the day being finished as I started working and sleeping at around 3:00 PM Amsterdam time. I did a ton of TouchArcade junk, then around maybe 9:00 PM I headed to this incredible Italian restaurant, which was the first place I actually ate when I arrived in Amsterdam. It seemed delightfully cyclical for that to also be my last meal, so I had basically the same thing (Spaghetti carbonara!) for dinner. I followed it up with some tiramisu which they served with a hot double tall shot of Heaven on Earth. It was ridiculous how well the drink went with the dessert. I mentioned on Facebook, it was bordering on a religious experience.

I woke up this morning stupid early, something like 5:30 AM or so and hopped in the shower and packed my bags to get ready to go. I’m glad I bought that extra leather bag while I was in Amsterdam as I NEVER would’ve been able to fit all my junk in my existing suitcase as I’ve picked up way too much swag since I arrived. So, I packed all my dirty laundry, souvenirs, and other junk I couldn’t bring on the plane in my actual suitcase and shoved the rest into my new bag to carry on. Aside from being a bit of a hassle, it worked out fine.

My flight from Amsterdam was delayed like crazy, as there were some super strong gusts of wind to deal with. Schiphol apparently was down to one runway, as the wind was so powerful they were on the verge of closing the airport. I’m not sure why they felt the need to tell us this over and over, as “Hey, your flight is delayed, we’ll get you guys going as soon as we can”  would’ve been totally significant. One last hit of Dutch pragmatism before leaving the country, I suppose.

The flight to Copenhagen was largely uneventful despite all the lip service about how horrifically windy it was. There wasn’t any major turbulence, and I was lucky enough to arrive with just barely enough time to quickly walk to the gate for my next flight and hop on the plane without needing to do any rebooking. This was a totally welcomed turn of events, although, looking back on it, it seemed like the alternative was to spend the night in Copenhagen and fly out to Iceland the next day which might not have been that terrible as I’ve never actually been to Copenhagen despite changing planes in its airport more times than I can count.

The actual flight to Iceland was great, I was fortunate in having a window seat so I got to look out at the whole southern coastline of the island before we landed. The geography here is crazy, as Iceland is 110% exactly like that typical arid frozen volcanic tundra area of video games. It’s eerie how familiar it feels because of that, despite being in a totally foreign environment.

The money here is something else. I turned 80€ into what seems like a stack of tens of thousands of ISK and a fist full of coinage. I need to find something to spend it on while I’m here though, as the value of ISK seems highly volatile compared to the Euro. Either way, it’s neat to add some new currency to my Jason Bourne passport pile. One thing that is even stranger than their money is just how far outside of the city their airport is. It felt like a good hour long, if not more, bus ride from the airport to get to Reykjavík. I’m not talking slow urban bus riding either, an hour at really high speed highway driving rates.

The hotel I’m staying at is ridiculously nice, and after the sort of dumpy place we stayed in Amsterdam I practically feel like Orphan Annie in comparison. Of the people I know here, I got the nicest room, and I think I know why, or at least, suspect. When I got off the bus I just let everyone of the 20-30 people who were with the group go in front of me to check in. I figure I’m not jet lagged at all, the American business day hasn’t started yet, and everyone looked way more tired than me.

What it seemed like they were doing was just assigning the rooms in order as people checked in, so, me being super polite inadvertently meant the only rooms left were top floor corner suites? Maybe? Either way, my room is awesome. One whole wall of windows faces the ocean while the other looks out at downtown Reykjavík.

I got settled, then quickly went to meet everyone for dinner, including Jared who is now sporting a pretty amazing beard. Dinner was at Grillmarkaðurinn which is this Icelandic … Steak house? I’m not sure how you’d classify it, but the food was out of this world. It was a great mix of really elaborate things I can recognize like blue New York strip steak slices and equally uncooked slices of whale.

The drinks were flowing like crazy, and me just doing my normal thing of being like “Bring me whatever it is you guys drink here” resulted in Icelandic white wine, red wine, the popular mixed drink (Which is a twist on the mojito, oddly enough!) and a shot of schnapps that either colloquially or roughly translated is seriously called “The Black Death.” It tastes like drinking liquid rye bread with a strong alcoholic bite. Totally crazy.

Oh, and, as weird as it is to take photos in the bathroom the sink at this place was rad. It was pretty dark so the photo didn’t turn out that great but basically the water comes down in the middle of this stone trough in a little waterfall. You don’t realize it initially, but this is actually open space with the women’s bathroom, but just under the mirror. The only thing that’s shared is the waterfall of water, so you stand there washing your hands and the women can see your hands and you can see theirs. It was a really cool idea.

Following dinner most of us headed over to this ultra dive bar nearby, and we arrived just for the end of American pop culture pub trivia. Weird, right? What got stranger is the area the DJ-like person was set up handling the trivia got handed off to a guy playing a guitar who then sang these incredibly strange not-quite-English covers of popular American country songs. You could recognize what he was playing, but what he was singing seemed like a mixture of English for the words he knew and Icelandic for the ones he didn’t.

Also noteworthy about this bar was whenever you ordered a drink they spun a big wheel behind them and you got whatever it landed on. Most of the areas it could land on were clearly marked as losers, but we watched more than a few people win free shots and beers, including the “meter long beer” which is basically exactly as advertised.

This was the first day since I arrived in Amsterdam that the weather was more in line with what it’s supposed to be like here. It was around 50 degrees out, which also consequently made this the first day that I was able to actually dress how I intended to when I packed by bag back in Chicago. So, add great weather, finally not needing to wear a dozen layers of clothes, and a whole city ahead of me, I decided it was high time for an ultra-long walk.

One of my favorite things to do in European cities, since they’re totally designed for walking, is just get totally lost wandering. I walked from the plantage where my hotel is on the extreme west side of the city to the complete opposite eastern end, then doubled back in a zig zag up and down every canal. It was about three hours of walking total, maybe a little bit more.

The one thing that sucked about today, is that even though it was really nice out the sky was super gloomy so all the photos I took made it look like the worst day ever. I think it’s a side effect of being so far north too, as even when it’s sunny out the sun doesn’t get very high in the sky. But, whatever, after walking miles I filled in all the blank areas of my mental map and was actually able to find most of the random destinations I was at previously between random wandering and weird landmarks I recognized like the above church tower.

I had planned on hitting the only big tourist destination I feel like I vaguely “missed” which was the Van Gogh museum. Apparently it’s been under an eternal renovation project but there’s some weird interactive digital exhibit on the opposite side of town. I went to check it out today, but they were charging something like 25€ to just look at digital versions of his paintings. Sure, I value curation, but I feel like if I want to just check out images of Van Gogh’s paintings I can easily do that online for free and likely get way more out of it than whatever the placards in this “museum” has to offer.

Other things I did today included hanging out at this super sweet (actual) coffee shop, sipping a stupid good cafe con leche and reading a book that was recently recommended to it. It sort of hit me today that if I could somehow weasel a way to do nothing but travel around and read in random foreign coffee shops for the rest of my life I’d be totally A-OK with that. There’s so many places I want to go, and so many books I want to read. What a great combination.

My wanderings concluded with Audra inviting me out to lunch with her boyfriend Mike in Waterlooplein. They’re regulars at this pub near their apartment and are basically treated as royalty there. They had club sandwiches made with beef tartare (which I guess is amazing even if it sounds weird) and I had the Dutch interpretation of a Philly cheesesteak. It was strangely spicy, and the cheese to meat ratio was marvelously biased towards cheese.

Mike had to leave to go into the office, so Audra and I hung around at this same pub and drank some beers trading stories of weird drama in the games industry, watching people come in wet from the sudden rain this afternoon, and waiting for the American business day to start. Working US hours in Europe is seriously just fantastic, as you get so much more accomplished with your day flipped around.

You’re motivated to get up and get moving as the longer you spend in bed the more of your time you cut into. The time shift allows you to get breakfast, spend the whole morning doing stuff, grab lunch, and maybe a few beers before starting what amounts to your working hours which go from around 4:00 PM until Midnight. When you’re done with work, you just go to bed.

I wish there was a way I could make this schedule work in the USA, but I’d need to essentially sleep from around 6:00 PM to 2:00 AM, which would be pretty weird unless I could somehow convince every business I frequent and everyone I know to also similarly shift their schedule. Otherwise, I’d just be up all night like some kind of vampire, eating at places like Steak n’ Shake and Denny’s, and shopping exclusively at Meijer.

I’m back at the hotel now, doing some TouchArcade stuff, and trying to come up with how I’m going to pack all my swag into my suitcase. I’m probably just going to head to the airport stupid early tomorrow morning, just to get breakfast or something. My trip there also involved two different types of public transport, and I just don’t want to worry about missing my flight to Iceland- Or even cutting it close, especially when the airport here is so incredibly nice.

Amsterdam has been incredible, and I hope I’m able to make it back soon. A week was almost the perfect amount of time, especially with the pace I kept. I can honestly say there’s not really anything substantial that I regret not doing.

Today was far and above the nicest day I’ve experienced in Amsterdam. The sky was a beautiful cloudy blue, and it was almost warm enough to not need a scarf. If nothing else, I didn’t need to wear my gloves and I could feel my toes walking around today so I’m more than happy with the weather. It’s supposed to be even nicer tomorrow.

Look at that sky! After the last five days, I didn’t even think it was possible for Amsterdam to be like this. I can only imagine the city in the summer. I bet it’s incredible.

Anyway, I got up early this morning to meet Brian for a super early breakfast before he had to catch his flight back to California. We also met up with Audra, who is vaguely part of the same PR/marketing industry “family” as Brian. I explained to them that after breakfast I wanted to hit up Tenue de Nîmes today, as everything I’ve read has made it sound like it is the designer jean destination of the city. Audra (who lives here in Amsterdam with her boyfriend) had never heard of it before, and asked to come along to check it out.

I ran back to the hotel to take a shower and get proper for a day of wandering around the city before meeting up with Audra in the nearby neighborhood of Waterlooplein. Tenue de Nîmes was around a two mile walk, but it was stupidly pleasant with the weather today. This is also the first day I’ve been able to wear my Chucks without my feet freezing off, so this made walking all over the city even better.

As advertised, Tenue de Nîmes was awesome. Something curious about the denim scene here is that they’ve gotten so used to what is “exotic” denim to me back in the USA that they’ve swung the complete opposite direction with a fascination focusing on jeans from North America. They had a really great selection of RRL, as well as ultra-high end cuts of Lee made with selvage denim (I didn’t even know these existed, odd.) and legit vintage “Big E” Levi’s from the 70′s. Most of these Levi’s were totally destroyed and repaired, which was really cool, but they’re still just Levi’s to me.

I was happy to find a pair of Naked & Famous Skinny Guys in my size though. They’re a designer denim house out of Canada, but it’s basically impossible to find them in the proper size for people as narrow and as long as I am. Here though, they had a whole stack of 30×34. They even had the 32oz Naked & Famous jeans, which are super limited edition and extreme collectors items. The fabric is so thick you practically can’t wear them, as they’ll quite literally stand up on their own, as the girl helping us demonstrated. They were asking 450€ for them, which seems kind of crazy for a pair of pants you basically can’t wear.

After dropping too much cash on some pants, neither of us really had anything to do for a few hours until the start of the American business day so we hung out at a local pub and had some beer while trading ridiculous war stories of games journalism. Audra is more focused on the AAA side of things, having launched games like The Sims, and it’s always crazy hearing about hijinks that happens in the  bigger budget side of things that rarely trickles down to mobile.

On the way back to our respective neighborhoods on the Eastern side of the city we walked past an open air market that I’d missed last time I walked to the high-end fashion side of town which focused on various plants and flowers. Holland produces tulips like whoa, and as I understand it, cultivating flowers and other elaborate garden projects is a bit of a national pastime.

By far the coolest thing I saw there was a stand that had all sorts of carnivorous plants. It’s really hard to get a sense of scale in this photo, but the pitcher plants they had were massive. Each of the red little pitchers above are around the size of a decent potato. I’ve got no idea how they are doing so well in Amsterdam’s climate, and I wonder how many people have stuck their fingers in them to necessitate signage. Probably lots.

I think that’s going to be all that is on the docket today. I’ve got a ton of stuff to do for work, and already spent close to nine hours wandering the city so spending the rest of the day in front of my computer seems pretty OK.

This morning I was feeling particularly hungry so I ordered what was labeled on the menu as the “American Breakfast,” under the assumption that everyone else huge or otherwise excessive has the suffix “USA.” Sadly, this was just a normal American breakfast of two eggs, some bacon, and toast, but it still totally hit the spot, especially when served with some fresh mint tea. That’s a thing over here. and I really need to figure out where I can get massive quantities of fresh mint sprigs back home to make lots and lots of tea with it.

Following breakfast, I had two main priorities today: Buying souvenirs for my family and picking up the real deal official non-replica local soccer jersey which also has become a bit of a tradition when traveling. Brian and I headed to what amounts to the shopping district in town with the first stop being some sort of chocolate shop that allegedly also sold soccer jerseys. They only had the fake tourist ones, so we got directions from the guy (Who was basically Andre the Giant’s twin, it was incredible) and picked up a few Euros worth of chocolate for his troubles.

This shopping area was amazing, and filled with awesomely stereotypical euro-trash clothes. Oddly enough, so many  places sold horrible Engrish on all sorts of articles of clothing which really makes no sense as there’s just no excuse for it, the Dutch speak fantastic English. The American-style sports stuff was the worst, like a t-shirt for the “First Sandwich Pick Fly Ball” team. I would’ve taken a photo but the security was being a little oppressive, constantly hovering nearby.

I found the tourist souvenir shop of my dreams, and have long since learned how to spot the ones where you’ll find the cheapest prices. See, they all basically sell the exact same junk, and you pay a massive premium for location and curation. This particular place was right off an alley, and they didn’t even bother taking their t-shirts out of the bags they come in from whatever South East Asian sweatshop conveyor belt they come off of. So, I was pleasantly surprised by how little everything cost compared to the same thing on the main drag of Amsterdam which I only didn’t buy previously because I didn’t feel like carrying it around all day.

With that checked off my to do list, we switched gears to soccer jersey mode. At the end of the street, there was an official Nike store, which we eventually got to but not before needing to ask several increasingly confused people where to go. I basically broke the dude’s brain at Foot Locker when I asked where to get a soccer jersey. The reaction I got was in line with how a robot would operate in an old cartoon where springs just explode from its head. I’m not good at correcting myself in saying “Football.”

We eventually made it to the basement of the Nike store where they had all the official soccer stuff for the main Dutch football team. I ended up getting the home orange jersey with Robin Van Persie’s name and number on it. That only set me back a disgustingly expensive 200€, but, whatever. The actual real jerseys the players wear are always super cool, and this one has all kinds of crazy detailing that the significantly cheaper replica jerseys lack, so, I’m totally satisfied.

It was going to take them around 20 minutes to do the lettering on my jersey, so Brian suggested we wander to a nearby bar for a “quick” beer. It’s named Gollem, and opened in the early 70′s as the first real beer bar in Amsterdam. They had 200 beers there, and glasses for most if not all of them, which is always super impressive to see. I started off with a Kwak which I’m fairly sure I’ve had before in the States as I specifically remember the unique glass which requires a holder as it was originally designed for use with the kind of “cup holder” you’d have in a horse drawn carriage.

We were their first customers of the day, and the bartender was awesome. He was essentially Yoda, but replace knowledge of The Force with knowledge of all things beer. This eventually leads Brian to mention how he’s always been looking for this ultra-rare beer called Trappist Westvleteren 12. The story behind it is that it’s made by these monks who follow a religious order that allows them to create and sell a product to fund their abbey. There’s nine different trappistes in the world, and this bar had all of them.

Trappist Westvleteren 12 is the rarest of all these beers because how hardcore the monks are about distributing it. The only “official” way you can get it is by driving to the abbey itself in Belgium at which point you can call them, and a monk will come out to sell you one case per car. Only 60,000 cases are made a year, which as far as beer production is concerned, is basically nothing. Initially the bartender said they didn’t have any, but one of the bar backs seemed to overhear us and managed to pull two incredibly dusty bottles out of the basement for us. 15€ a piece and aged close to five years.

This beer has a score of a perfect 100 on Beer Advocate, and after trying it, I see why it’s so special. I’m not big into the whole beer criticism thing, so I can’t really accurately describe the quality of the head and aftertaste, but it was just stupid complex, with all of these different flavors and smells hitting you at different times like some kind of crazy Willy Wonka concoction. We’ve had so much good beer here.

After spending way too much money on beer (and t-shirts, which I would’ve bought as well if they had a small) we headed off to pick up my jersey before setting our destination as the restaurant run by the same owners of this bar. The bartender was telling us about it, and apparently it’s all Belgian food with everything cooked in or incorporating beer in one way or another. A “short” walk, and we were there.

It seems like in Europe you can tell how legit a place is by how many errant cats there are roaming around. This restaurant had three, including the above cat that just sat there like a statue on one of the highest shelves in the bar making sure everything is in order. The two other cats, proudly marched around, stopping at tables to politely wait for scraps of food.

As an appetizer we got a assortment of croquettes which were just OK in my eyes, and some fresh baked bread with four different sauces- Two cream based, one olive based, and another that was some sort of cheesy beef tallow mixture which was just out of this world. By the time our food arrived we were on beer number three, continuing to drink crazy exotic beers and whatever the bartender recommended.

For dinner, Brian got a massive pot full of mussels which were simmered in beer and I got the rib roast. It’s what the bartender at the previous bar recommended, and it seems silly to not follow a recommendation like that. I wasn’t disappointed, although this amount of food and beer created a DEFCON 5 level nap emergency.

On the way back to the hotel I finally got to see what the Dutch call “reclaiming” their land from the sea. Narrowing the canals to create more land both as the canals apparently become less relevant and as property value  continues to rise is a big thing here, and it was neat seeing the whole setup. Although, being Sunday, no work was actively being done.

It quickly got dark, and our walk back to the hotel put us straight through the red light district which, again, being Sunday, was totally dead. We found another bar on the way which we stopped at for some reason, to get a Jupiler, which is the local super-low-end beer. It’s not good, and if nothing else, served as fantastic contrast for the great beers I spent the day drinking.

With everything closing up (aside from “coffee” shops, unsurprisingly) there wasn’t much left to do but go back to the hotel sort of early. Brian is flying out tomorrow, so we’re getting breakfast mega-early before I continue my Amsterdam adventures solo over the next two and a half days. This has been such a great trip so far.

Today started with hitting up the same awesome breakfast place I went to two days ago, where Brian and I ordered a breakfast feast to start the day. Eggs, bacon, toast, croissants, coffee, orange juice, and more. I was going to order the “Muffin USA” which apparently is synonymous with “a really big muffin” here but they were out. We joked that the muffin was likely so large that they only have space to store two inside of their pantry.

We hopped our our bikes and pedaled down to do an ultra-touristy canal tour. It actually was really great, although the amount of ice in the canals was beyond worrisome at times. More than a few canals our boat was just breaking directly through one to two inch thick ice. It was really crazy, and sounded totally nuts as it scraped up against the hull of the ship. The captain didn’t seemed worried at all, so, that was cool I guess. We saw a ton of the city via canal, and it was totally worth every cent of the 8,50€ the ticket cost.

Our captain slash tour guide had some pretty choice quotes exhibiting some prime examples of Dutch pragmatism. He ranted at length regarding people who wanted to walk on the ice and fell through, mentioning something along the lines of, “You have no idea how hard it is to get bodies out from under the ice.” Also, apparently one of the most recent casualties was an Asian tourist who tried to stand on the ice to retrieve his camera. As our guide told us, ”Nothing against Chinese people but really do you have to make picture of everything that moves?”

It was ridiculously cold and windy today, and when you added snow into the mix Brian made the executive decision that we should just return our bikes early- Something I effortlessly agreed with as biking in fresh snow was not only incredibly miserable but also very dicey from an overall traction perspective. You know it’s bad when you see Dutch people who were practically born on a bike seat are coming close to wiping out biking down the street.

Instead of biking all over like idiots in the snow, we got some Heinekens, which was a much more appealing proposition. Much like how super-fresh Guinness is exponentially better, Heineken over here is insane. It seems like back in the USA Heineken is a largely mediocre run-of-the-mill light beer. Here, it’s like drinking liquid honey. Just how strong of a honey taste it has is totally lost in transport it’d seem. This particular pub was also serving some pretty radical grilled cheese and ham sandwiches with tomato soup. No complaints, all around.

With no bikes, travel switched to the tram system. It’s arguable whether it’s worse biking into the wind or simply standing in the wind not moving waiting for the tram to show up. If nothing else, the trams are kept very warm, so that’s nice at least.

We took the tram down to the largest open air market in Amsterdam, which any other day would be a bustling hub of commerce. Today, however, things were covered in the snow that was falling, which made for some interesting sights as the merchants just didn’t have the infrastructure for dealing with covering their things to get it out of the snow.

We also finally succeeded in finding stroopwaffels, which Brian has been talking about since we got here. They’re essentially two freshly cooked super thin wafer cookie things with carmel in between. It was good, but, I’m not sure a stroopwaffel was worth the days of anticipation. Crepes are better!

Next step (or, tram ride and long walk, more accurately) was the only operating brewery in Amsterdam which also happened to be the only full-sized windmill in the city. The Brouwerij ‘t IJ was swarming with Americans, which was sort of interesting as you have the opportunity to overhear a lot of really dumb things.

I tried a couple different beers here, and they were all fantastic. We also got a cheese plate which (surprise!) was also great. The bathrooms at the brewery were awesome in that it was basically just a room with a trough and graffiti everywhere in every language imaginable- Including a few that I couldn’t even recognize.

I bought my first t-shirt of the trip at this brewery, mainly because the label from their IPA is just perfect as it’s in the style of a pin-up girl but all the information about the beer like ABV and stuff is cleverly displayed as tattoos on the girl. It’s definitely not something I’d usually wear, but from a graphic design standpoint it seemed really clever.

Following the brewery, we took another “short” walk back to the hotel for a quick nap before dinner. After an hour or so of power-napping, I woke up and Brian and I headed back to Paloma to get some more incredible Italian food. This time I got a four cheese lasagna which came in a crock pot like thing filled to the brim with alfredo sauce and then topped with a stupid amount of melted cheese. It was silly, and so heavy that the portioning could’ve been like 1/3 what I got and I still would’ve been satisfied.

After dinner we went to go meet Brian’s friend Andrew who works as a bartender at a hostel called The Flying Pig. This bar was like being at a basement party, except with beers being sold for a few Euros. Tonight also apparently was Australia Day back in Australia, so all of these Australians were coming out of the woodwork to celebrate. Australia Day, as far as I can tell, commemorates when the British claimed the island as a prison, which seems a little weird to celebrate. Regardless, the theme of the night seemed to be drunk Australians.

Also, apparently, regardless of the fact that most (all?) tables have no smoking signs on them, there were also ash trays everywhere that were full as well as discarded packs of cigarettes. They’re sending a real mixed message here.

After hitting a few different bars and drinking a ton of beer we hit up FEBO, which is a Dutch automat, on the recommendation of some dudes who overheard us talking about what kind of food to get while in line at the ATM. FEBO apparently is “totally authentic,” a phrase which appears to be code for “totally terrible.” The croquet I had was horrifying, so I washed my mouth out with some kebab.

A quick cab ride later (via a driver who didn’t have change for a 50€ bill for some reason) and we were back at the hotel. I’ve got no idea what’s going on tomorrow, but hopefully it involves a whiskey bar and buying soccer jerseys.

This morning started with breakfast at a local pub with the same crew that I went out with the night before. Dutch breakfasts are really great, as the staple here seems to be an open faced sandwich of sorts, covered in meat, cheese, and eggs. It’s surprisingly light, even if it doesn’t look like it. I’m glad I didn’t try to fight against carbohydrates this trip, as it would’ve been impossible to eat- Especially in Amsterdam.

Following breakfast we biked it over to the expensive part of the city with the primary mission being my international tradition of buying expensive blue jeans. Initially my sights were set on a denim bar called “Spoiled,” but it turned out their selection was truly terrible. The dutch seem to be absolutely fascinated by Levi’s, so while they had a bunch of high-end stuff, it was largely limited to Levi’s cuts.

Levi’s is doing a new thing that’s catching on in a big way here that’s actually sort of cool though. Apparently they’re bringing back all their super old designs and dipping into some cache of vintage denim to do it with. That’s neat, but a pair of 501′s, even made with 50 year old selvage denim, are still 501′s in my eyes. The people at Spoiled were super friendly (a definite trend here in Amsterdam) and suggested if I were looking for Italian denim to head to Bendorff which was conveniently located across the street.

Bendorff had exactly what I was looking for, and all said and done I picked up a pair of Nudie Grim Tim jeans in this wicked heavily distressed selvage material, a washed Conny jacket to supplement my existing dry one at home, and I finally rationalized actually buying a nice belt. Brian came with me for this excursion, as I originally was met with skepticism and bewilderment when I explained to him how much I spend on pants.

He watched with a raised eyebrow as I inspected the washes, fabric types, and selvage seams before finally buckling and trying on some for himself. Well, we’ve got a new convert. I still won as far as overall Euros spent, but Brian walked out with two pairs of dry jeans as well- Quickly discovering that I’m not as crazy as most people think I am in that when I buy expensive stuff I’m buying it because it’s actually incredibly nice.

Today was the first day we’ve had a significant amount of sun since I got here. Oddly enough, it’s also easily the coldest day so far as well. The above photo with some reasonable lighting would’ve turned out really cool, but, we’re far north enough that when the sun comes out it sits really low in the horizon which makes both photography and just having your eyes open more than a squint more or less impossible. I was so proud of myself for packing so light, but, I’m just going to go ahead and add sunglasses to the list of things I really should’ve brought along with winter boots, wool socks, thicker gloves, and all the other winter gear I made a conscious decision to leave at home.

After Bendorff we biked it back over to this permanent flea market installation which had people selling everything from cold weather jump suits and snow pants straight out of the 1980′s, all sorts of drug paraphernalia, and tons of other crazy things. Outdoor markets here are the kind of place where you can basically think of anything you’d want to buy and they’d not only have it but also have it in two colors. Brian bought some ear muffs, and then we wandered over to this dude who sells nothing but leather bags that I got my murse from previously.

I picked up a small-ish sized gym bag looking thing of sorts made out of the same highly distressed black and olive green leather (Which allegedly is only available in Holland) as the other bag I bought. 30€ was all it cost, which seriously just seems wrong. Either these bags are just going to disintegrate in the rain or they’re made by  child slave laborers. Or both, I suppose, potentially.

After that, we biked back to the hotel to dump off our spoils before heading back out to a mid-afternoon pub for a beer before starting the American business day. All of this biking is fantastic, as it’s undeniably the best way to get around Amsterdam but I am getting the worst case of bike butt. Also, I was telling Brian that I can run for miles, climb stairs for quite literally hours with the only main stopping point being me just getting bored before getting tired, but biking for whatever reason tires me out like nothing else. It’s not helping that I’m now basically biking standing up to avoid continued butt bruising.

Oh, we also hit up this incredible beer store. I wish I could’ve got a better photo but everything was super cramped and the lighting sucked. Imagine this shelf here, but everywhere. They also had tons of weird collectable junk I’ve never seen before like special edition Delirium Tremens sold in tins and giant bottles of beer designed for cellaring. Glassware seems a little difficult to come by in the USA, unless you just don’t mind stealing glasses from bars, but the collection they had here was just bonkers. I wish I could come up with a good way to bring some of this stuff home, but, really, I could probably save time and money by just pouring beer and shards of glass in my suitcase prior to checking it and have the same end result.

I got back to the hotel, changed into my new clothes just for fun, and we headed our for beers. I know they swear up and down that there’s no difference, but Guinness in Europe is insane and significantly better than the Guinness we have in the USA. I’m not sure if it’s freshness, that combined with a perfect pour, or something else entirely but it’s almost like Guinness abroad is a totally different beer. I’m not sure a pint is worth 6€, but, still.

After beers we grabbed some kebab from a… Asian kebab place? My döner kebab was awesome, so I can’t really complain, but I’m totally used to kebab being food served by barely-English-speaking Middle Eastern guys out of a hole in the wall that’s so filthy that you’re fully aware and just accepted the risk that you could die eating there. I got my first taste of Dutch french fries (or at least, I think that’s what they call them here) and they’re fried twice which creates this super crispy outside and mega-pillowy interior. So, despite being the most atypical kebab place I’ve ever been to, the food was phenomenal.

Once again we biked back to the hotel, I did some work real quick, took a short nap, and have been doing TouchArcade stuff ever since. I don’t think we’re going to go out tonight, as it’s already midnight and I’m still working, having just taken a break to bang this out, but this weekend seems to be pretty full with a good mix of touristy and local stuff. There’s even plans to hit up a whiskey bar where things are served directly out of real wooden barrels.

This trip has been fantastic from an overall social revelation standpoint. Looking back on it, I think spending time in Finland was a major turning point in realizing just how comparatively terrible things are in the United States and that despite what some Americans would have you believe, socialism provides for some incredible things when you’ve got an entire country focused on working as a team instead of just looking out for yourself. As an American, you’re sort of just raised thinking things like high taxes are bad, you just want the government to stay out your business, and all that. In actuality, I’m not sure anyone benefits from this mentality, and it really took just meeting random Finns and hearing about their lives to totally cement this realization.

Similarly, I’ve always been incredibly liberal in regards to how silly it has seemed to criminalize so many things in the USA, but you just sort of accept it and move on. As a kid all the “war on drugs” stuff was pounded into your head so hard, so the latent remnants of the whole “drugs are bad” thing is basically always there. The amount of people incarcerated in our country for things that are legal here is really pretty crazy, especially when you think of the cost, but in my day to day life what’s going on in our prison systems couldn’t be more out of sight and out of mind.

After spending some time here, it just makes so much more sense to regulate and tax all of these vices almost to the point of it making me angry that we don’t. I mean, if prostitution is your jam, you just walk down to the red light district. Cops are everywhere there keeping a tight eye on things, which just generally seems to create a safer overall environment. If people are going to do that anyway, why not try to make it as safe and regulated as reasonably possible, and make a tax scrape off of it to fund things in the country that people actually need? It all just seems too logical.

Somewhat similarly, you can just pick your preferred THC delivery device and just go nuts here. These suckers are everywhere, I mean absolutely everywhere. It’d probably be easier to list places in Amsterdam where they’re not for sale. This particular photo was just at the flea market I mentioned earlier. Drugs aren’t really my thing, but when you compare the American way of doing things of spending untold tens of thousands of dollars keeping someone in jail for minor drug offenses versus just having everything easily available and regulated really makes the way we do things confusing.

Amsterdam is one of the best cities I’ve been to, and you’re absolutely surrounded by what would be “crime” back home. Is the city some kind of Lord of the Flies warrior tribe anarchy state completely ruined by drugs and prostitution? Of course not. Everything is clean, all the people are nice, and it’s just no big deal. In fact, even staying out late at night, I haven’t even felt the remote vague inkling or being unsafe or in danger on any level- And I feel like with the amount of traveling I’ve done I’m pretty well tuned into these things.

With the amount of stuff I’ve been doing each day it feels like I’ve been here forever. This weekend is going to be awesome.

This is the first day since I entered the European Union that I even vaguely had the opportunity to sleep in. After needing to be up, already have eaten breakfast, and be ready to roll by 8:30 AM (or way earlier, for my flight from Marseille to Amsterdam) being able to sleep until 10:00 AM was an incredible luxury. I’ve been pushing hard and heavy on the Ambien this trip, and haven’t really had any negative side effects to speak of, so that’s cool.

My buddy Brian and I met up to get some breakfast at a nearby coffee place late this morning, and it just so happens they also make amazing breakfast there. I had a cafe con leche which was just out of this world, followed by this crazy not-quite-a-breakfast-sandwich sandwich consisting of toast, bacon, cheese, and scrambled eggs. After the whole ketosis siet thing I’ve become an incredible stickler for acceptable scrambled eggs as I’ve gotten to the point of basically cooking them to perfection, and these were no slouch.

Once breakfast was over, we went to go rent bikes which went off without a hitch. 50€ is buying me a bike rental for the duration of my trip, complete with insurance in case it gets stolen. That seems pretty radical given both the prices of taxies and the tram. Having not ridden a bike with any regularity since basically before I could drive it took a little while to gain biking confidence, but after about 15 minutes we were both zooming around Amsterdam. It’s a truly unique experience biking here, since as long as you follow the few vague signs and markings you basically have complete right of way.

It’s really kind of ridiculous, at least from an American perspective, as riding a bike through Amsterdam is basically like parting the Red Sea. Everyone moves, cars stop for you, etc. You just go where you want to go, and as long as you obey the triangles on the sidewalk to yield right of way to other bikes to merge on to main bike paths, you’re good to go. One thing that we’re doing which seems a little silly to me is that in the absence of anything to chain our bikes to, we’re just chaining them together.

Brian insists that no one will steal them, but the way I look at this is that two bikes chain together is more or less just a two-for-one for any thief out there. Although, I suppose for this to work you’d need some sort of pick up truck to throw the bikes into and I’ve yet to see one of those in Amsterdam. So, we might be safe. Either that or bike thieves just want nothing to do with the absolute most touristy grandma bikes on the planet. That’s another possibility- And a strong one at that.

So, with our new whips we headed to Rembrant’s house which actually was pretty fascinating and huge. Apparently here in The Netherlands, property tax is calculated based on the square footage of your land, which is why so many of the houses are so ridiculously narrow and small. In fact, “dutch staircases” are a thing, in that your typical building has a spiral staircase to get upstairs that’s so narrow you’re basically climbing a ladder that vaguely looks like stairs.

It’s hard to really get a perspective on this photo, but the longest wall you can see is maybe six feet long. Meanwhile, the stairs leading down will descend an entire story. It’s crazy, and this stairwell in particular is at our hotel and isn’t even the worst one I’ve come across yet. The stairs to get down to the bathroom at the restaurant we went to for dinner was more or less like changing levels in a submarine.

Anyway, Rembrant’s house was great. Apparently he totally over-extended himself financially, so lucky for historians, there’s a shockingly accurate account of the contents of his house and where it all went thanks to the bankruptcy proceedings. We saw his studio, got a demonstration on how the plate etching and printing process worked, and got to see his collection of natural artifacts which ranged from pieces of ancient greek sculpture to a stuffed armadillo and everything in between.

Following that, we headed off to the Rijksmuseum which is Amsterdam’s collection of paintings from Dutch masters. Inside was all sorts of exhibits ranging from elaborate doll houses to various pieces of porcelain to paintings out the wazoo. This all makes me wish I knew more about art, as it seems like when I go to museums like this I just try to absorb as much as I can and hope I recognize it later. The only thing I really knew of the whole museum was Rembrandt’s The Night Watch which I found to be personally fairly disappointing since that painting is basically as recognizable as the Mona Lisa and other seriously noteworthy pieces of art.

After hitting two different museums it was around lunch time and ended up getting some killer sandwiches (and actual coffee) directly across the street from the not-so-inconspicuously named “Coffeeshop Reefer.” We sat and ate lunch, watching the various boats pass by the canal and different groups of unruly school kids out on the prowl- All of which seemed to enjoy the snow significantly more than we were.

Lunch was followed by hitting up this apparently permanent street market affair that we stumbled across earlier to buy some really cool leather bags. For 10€ I picked up a cool little bag that’s just barely big enough for an iPad mini, a pair of headphones and sunglasses. I think it looks cool, but it is every bit a murse, and I’m not quite sure how I feel about that.

In the early afternoon I returned to the hotel to clear out my email inbox and do some other work. Time quickly flew by, and it seemed like a few moments later we were out on the town again. Brian and I got invited out to this ultra-fancy Dutch restaurant called Greetlje which apparently is deep down the spectrum of Amsterdam fine dining. to start, we ordered a bunch of small plates ranging from bread served with pig fat, black pudding, goat cheese pearls, venison pastrami, and some sort of crazy foie gras mini sandwich that was basically the bastard child of incredible foie gras and french toast.

When at restaurants like this, I typically just tell the waiter to bring me whatever the best thing they have is since I really don’t consider myself a connoisseur of Dutch food, or really, even able to make an intelligent decision when staring down the barrel of a mega-Dutch menu. This resulted in a suggestion of veal shank being the best thing the restaurant has to offer.

I’m not really crazy about veal on any level, especially American veal which largely is raised and kept completely in stocks. I always avoid eating veal whenever possible because of this, but, I feel like if you’re at a fancy restaurant and the waiter recommends veal, you shut your mouth and eat it. Additionally, apparently, European veal isn’t anywhere near as cruel as American veal. European veal is merely well-handled young cows, versus young cows basically kept in miserable captivity until they’re killed. So, my conscious is… slightly clear?

Brian got pheasant, which seemed especially legit, and exponentially more so when he pulled a tiny pellet of bird shot out of his mouth.

Dinner was followed by a digestif of something called “Heaven on Earth” which is a liqueur that, if the waiter is to believed, is only available in Amsterdam. The best way to describe it was an infinitely more complex version of an almond liqueur like amaretto or something. Except where amaretto takes a turn for the disgustingly sweet, this hinges more on super strong herbal notes. I’d love to find this stuff back home, and I really hope it’s possible, as this is easily as much of a drinking revelation as glögi was in Finland.

A quick walk back to the hotel and I was online and ready to record our podcast, but unfortunately, the hotel WiFi is sucking too badly tonight for Skype to even work for Jared and Brad are regrettably flying solo. If there’s one universal constant in life, it’s that hotel WiFi always sucks. Even if it did work, there was some constant annoying beeping which Brian later discovered to be some people who were allegedly trapped in our elevator that he rescued.

A true American hero.

Regardless of the factual accuracy of this supposed rescue, Amsterdam has been awesome so far and it’s been infinitely more fun to travel with another guy I know who is intimately familiar with the city than going to something like this myself- Even if it involves lots of awkward biking.