Queen's Day Eve in Amsterdam
Decided that as the last of my American friends in Eindhoven had gone home the last weekend, I may as well spend Queen's Day Eve with my new friends from Trav Buddy at the meet-up in Amsterdam. As I had decided to take off work on Monday and Tuesday, I decided to head up early to check out the latest books at the American Book Store in Spui before heading back to the hotel to nap and prepare for the meet-up.
Just before heading over to the bookstore, however, I got a phone call from Wendy (wendyveer) saying that she had decided that she would be coming as well, and that she, Alex and some of the others would be meeting at 4PM at the coffee house (NOT coffeeshop) across from Central Station. Cool!
Ran up and did my book shopping.
Got to the coffeehouse Smids and met up with Alex-b who was enjoying his capuccino and apple pie. We were soon met by Wendy, then Bennie and his friend Jamal, Melissa and her friend Ivo, and finally Sylvie. We headed over to Melissa's apartment (via the very long route as we found on the way back) to drop off some bags then after a while of trying to decide if we wanted to try to get food, back to the Hotel Bellvue to start the meet-up.
When we got to the restaurant at the Hotel, we met Kanak (and his travel colleague who is not on TB), Carlin (Airwalker), and Sonja, soon joined by Alex (Canonball26), Rishi (orangematter) and ultimately Christy (70sChild), Katie (leelu), and I think every other person who was staying in their hostel! At this point we wandered up to a bar in the Spui square (well, two bars...one for most of the group, and one for the Man U/Barca Game). From here we started to wander to another bar in the area when we were rejoined by Melissa, Bennie, Sylvie, Ivo the off we were to the next bar.
We got here just in time and were able to grab en entire half of the bar for our group, shared some pitchers and other drinks, were rejoined by Alex and joined by Johan, and then decided to wander off towards Remprandtplein. We never did quite make it into the square as it was mobbed, but drank some canned beers on the street before heading off to a club near the prior bar where we stayed until 4AM or so. Our coats got checked as some point, and the coat check was in the very bottom of the bar at the front of the dance floor. It was insanely packed up there! I made the trek up to the check area two or three times, the final time coming out with Carlin's coat and I think Christy's sweater...don't know how I managed that one, I was barely able to keep my eyes open but managed to push my way up and grab the coats without causing a riot.
Got back to the hotel and chilled a few minutes with Alex and Wendy while Johan walked Rishi back to his hotel then we ran into Kanak and his friend (I think his name was Rav) who were going to grab some food, so I joined them while Alex, Wendy and Johan went back to Johan's place to crash. I stayed at the hotel as I had to take an early train back to Eindhoven 3 hours later in order to catch my flight to Stockholm.
Thanks to Carlin for arranging and Kanak for bringing us all together...I had a great time...wish I could have stayed for the big day itself...
Located near Spui square, not far from Rembrandtplein, Dam Square and Leidseplein.
Keep in mind that they do not open until 10:00 PM, but there are plenty of other places nearby to start off at before coming here for the remaining hours.
