I AMsterdam!

I just got back from Amsterdam a couple days ago and it was awesome!

I took the Eurostar from London to Brussels, then transferring trains onwards to Amsterdam.

The first thing I noticed is that nobody in Amsterdam drives... everyone bikes. The bike has replaced the car in The Netherlands! When I told my hosts that I drive a car at home in Canada,  they looked at me like I was insane! But then I explained that in Canada everything is so much bigger and if I tried to bike from one end of my city to the other, it would take me hours.

The first day I got there, the host I was staying with brought her bike to come pick me up from the train station and she was like "well hop on, we've got a 20 min bike ride" and i was like "... but i have a suitcase?" and she was like "just roll it behind us!" So here I am sitting sideways on the back of this bike while she peddles, and I am rolling my suitcase behind the bike! For any of us not from the Netherlands, this would've looked hilarious... but to them it was totally normal. It was one of the funniest things I've ever done in my life and probably ever will do.

I didn't really know what to expect in Amsterdam. After 2 days of being there, I still felt like I hadn't really seen anything.... but then I kind of realized something - that Amsterdam, even though it's as infamous as say London or Paris, it doesn't really have the sights like they do. I didn't see any monuments (similar to Big Ben or the Eiffel Tower), or anything else of this nature. Instead I realized that Amsterdam was more about the people and their lifestyle; their bike-culture, the laid-backness of the people, strolling along the canals, lounging in the squares, and the unique architecture of the houses and buildings ... this is the culture of Amsterdam. And of course you can't forget the famed Red Light District and the Coffeeshops.

If you plan on going to the Anne Frank house, be well aware of the que times. I was quite interested in doing it, however the ques were about 3 hours long before the house had even opened. Personally, I didn't have this kind of time to kill during my time in Amsterdam!

My hosts also took me to this incredible garden/park called Vondelpark. Since it is April, all the flowers were starting to bloom and it was just beautiful! This park is extremely popular with the locals. You will see tons of people of all ages enjoying picnics and drinks on the grass and benches here. I highly recommend this park for a stroll if you need some down-time from wandering the streets.

For me, Amsterdam was a different kind of holiday... but definitely in a good way and I would love to return one day!

Edinburgh!

Edinburgh, so I've read, is one of the most beautiful cities in all of Europe... and I totally concur with this claim now that I've been there myself.

Edinburgh has an almost medieval appearance with a fortress style castle overlooking the city and completely monochromatic buildings throughout. The buildings themselves each look like medieval castles of some sort.

At the north edge of Edinburgh is the North Sea. Surrounding the city however, are quite lush green rolling hills; one of which is called Arthur's Seat and is a hot spot for tourists to hike up to to get incredible views of Edinburgh, nearby villages, and the North Sea coastline. It's actually an extinct volcano, as is the hill that Edinburgh Castle is built upon.The Castle of course also provides some panoramic views of Edinburgh below and is easily reachable by foot.

Another notable vantage point for pictures are up on Calton Hill where you'll find some interesting monuments including an Athenian Acropolis. It only takes about 5 minutes to get to the top from the Regent Road staircase on the Southside.

Also in Edinburgh is the Palace of Holyroodhouse which is the Queen's official residence when she's in Scotland. It's directly across the street from the Scottish Parliament. It's a very modern and rather artsy building, built just in 1999. Tourists can go inside, so I did. It was neat to see some of the acts and commissions that have formed the laws in Scotland today and also see the debating chamber where all assemblies take place. I saw one of the acts which in 1457 banned all golf and football (soccer) because King James II wanted people to practice archery instead so they could be more useful in defence for the country.

Edinburgh doesn't have any shortage of places to go or things to see, especially with the infamous shopping streets: the Royal Mile and Princes Street.

The city has a lot of green space which makes up for the lack of color everywhere else in the city.

Swiss-land!

For Easter in England, we got two weeks off from uni so I though it would be a prime time to do some travelling. I flew from London to Basel, Switzerland with Easyjet and guess how much it cost me round-trip.... 57GBP which is around 100CAD! In comparison to Canadian flight costs, this is dirt cheap! 

I flew into Basel because I have some friends who live there, who were study abroad students in my program in Canada. Basel is a very artistic city with tons of modern art sculptures and with murals and paintings on almost every building. The city has the Rhine River flowing through it, with several park benches lined along it for those to enjoy the beautiful scenery.

For it being April in Switzerland, it was considerably warm when I was there! Somewhere around 25°C... I even had tan lines! The first night I got there my friends had already bought me a ticket to the International Music Festival, also called Les Museiques that plays in Basel every year.  It's a massive event that is very popular and was totally worth going to! The festival includes various genres of music, played in numerous different museums and art venues all over Basel, and your wristband/ticket gets you into each of them. You just hop on a tram and go from one to the next! 

From Basel I caught the train to Lucerne. Lucerne is amazing! The city, Lake Lucerne, and the 3 major mountains surrounding it: Mt. Pilatus, Mt. Stanserhorn, and Mt. Rigi. Lucerne is a total postcard-picture-perfect spot. It's also a 'walking city'. I didn't have a map or guide, and I ended up finding all the main sights on foot by myself. Here's my favourite spots:

- the Chapel Bridge: an icon of Lucerne. The wooden bridge actually caught on fire in the 90's and had to be re-built, but the tower is still the original structure.

- the old city wall: this medieval wall was built in the 1300's and are mostly still in tact!

-the Lion of Lucerne: this lion monument carved out of the cliff face, was built to commemorate the more than 600 Swiss soldiers who lost their lives during the French Revolution when the Tuileries Palace in Paris was invaded

Being in the center of the Alps I couldn't resist the urge to go to the top of one of these incredible mountains. So from Lucerne I took a train to Goldau, and connected with a Cogwheel train that took me to the top of MT. Rigi on the opposite side of Lake Lucerne. It's in the north-eastern Alps with a summit of 1,797m. Towards the North you see a flat Switzerland of tiny cities and villages, and towards the South are the major peaks of the Alps; no human life, just mountains.

I finished my trip in Switzerland with Zurich. There's the typical 'Old Town' of Zurich with historic churches, monuments, and buildings, and then you come to Lake Zurich which splits the city along 2 banks. I walked for about a 1/2hr past the 'Old Town' along the lake and got some gorgeous pictures with the Alps in the backdrop. 

From what I could sense, Zurich has a bit of everything: culture, accessibility, nature, and it seems very multi-cultural. Although of course, you can sense the typical commerce vibe that most major capitals have.... "busy, busy, busy, go, go, go".

I didn't expect to love Switzerland as much as I did, but I was actually really sad to leave! I wouldn't argue that it's one of the most beautiful countries in the world.

Until next time...  
Tschüss!