Day 2 Amsterdam

Today I decided to walk around Amsterdam and just see what there was to see.

 This is the Dam monument

 Canals crisscrossed all over the city.

 I thought this was a cool building.

 Peoples's backyards.

 Tyler in front of the Rijksmuseum.  He was not very happy today.  He did not want to be in his stroller and thought I should hold him while I walked.  We went to an outdoor market and a floating flower market.  I bought some Frittes with mayo (how everyone here eats them) and I was being so careful and then my backpack fell and knocked most of them on the ground.  So I decided it was time to go back to the hotel.  This was one of the stops we made because he was getting heavy.  He really loves posing for the camera.  You say cheese and he just smiles so big.  On the way back to the hotel he did fall asleep in his stroller and I was able to just walk around the city and enjoy it.

 For lunch I stopped by McDonalds and got a Big and Tasty with bacon.  It was delicious.  Probably the best thing I ever had at McDonalds.  Their fries even came with a fritte sauce.

 That night we took a canal tour of the city.  It was raining outside which made it a little hard to see.

 Amsterdam is famous for its bikes.  Every one rides bikes and we saw some very interesting ones.  These are all the ones parked at the train station.  Our tour guide said Amsterdam had 800,000 (????) people and 700,000 bikes.  Bikes also have the right away .  They have their own lanes in the streets.  To cross the street you had to walk across the bike lane, the tram lanes, and the car lanes.  It was a little scary.

 The cars all parked on the edge of the canals.  We wondered how many people had driven home high or drunk and had ended up in the canal.

For dinner we were walking around and came across a hamburger place that was very crowded and as we passed by we heard several people not in the store talking about it, so we decided to give it a try, it was very good.

I also found a grocery store on my trip around town today and bought some pastries for breakfast and a smoothie.  I also bought a LARGE bottle of diet coke to take to the hotel and put on ice for later.  I had felt so dehydrated on this trip, since Europe doesn't believe in big drinks.