And the answer is . . .

. . . . Amsterdam! I guess my pictures were too easy; everyone got it right.

First of all, don’t worry – BumBum did not inhale.

Ok, here is the story of our weekend. At the beginning of the week, we didn’t have plans for the weekend. So we decided to take advantage of an open weekend and be spontaneous (we have been warned over and over that that word will vanish from our vocabulary after BumBum arrives) and headed to Amsterdam for a quick weekend city break. It is only a 45 minute flight from London!

We arrived, checked in at the hotel, then headed out for a late dinner. We past several lovely places near our hotel, but opted to go towards Leidsplein Square, which is where all the action is at night. It is lined with cafes, pubs, etc. and has the requisite McD's to ensure its status as a tourist trap. Which also makes it a great place to people watch. And in Amsterdam there are lots of interesting sites, some architectural, but mostly people. We found a decent Italian place a block or so off the square. Being old and well, pregnant, we had a nice leisurely walk back to the hotel instead of a mad dash to the infamous clubs.

Saturday morning we unfortunately (in my opinion, other parties involved probably disagree) slept until noon! That bed was heaven and we certainly relished the air conditioning since our flat in London is lacking in that department (and honestly, there have been less than 5 nights this summer when we even needed it. So depressing). Moving on.

I had been to Amsterdam once before, but only for a 9 hour layover and all we did was the Anne Frank Museum and try to avoid bikers. I am not sure what the numbers are, but Amsterdam has to be one of the bike capitals of the world. They are everywhere! Pat and I bet each other on who would get hit by one first. Luckily, we both made it through the weekend untouched.

Pat and I decided that we wanted to see the Museum Amstelkring and the Van Gogh Museum and we would do one each day. So after our late breakfast we headed out towards Amstelkring, which is a 17th century canal house that hides a Catholic Church, Ons’ Lieve Heer op Solder (Our Lord in the Attic), in the upper floors. It is a perfectly preserved example of the clandestine churches that popped up after the Alteration, which banned Catholics from worshiping in public in the late 1500’s. It was used as a place of worship from 1663 – 1887, when locals pooled resources and artifacts to turn it into a museum.

Here is a picture of the altar. It is a small, narrow, and intimate space. They still have Mass there once a week and hold weddings (I think there was one the day we were there bc it was closed for a couple hours in the early afternoon before we arrived).



It was a sunny and lovely, albeit a little chilly day so we spend the rest of the day just wandering around. I love the canals and the houses & buildings that line the canals. Along with the very laid back atmosphere that permeates the city, the numerous cafes & pubs make it a great place to just chill. And they were lots of people in town doing just that. Arsenal (a European football team from London) had played the Amsterdam Ajax on Friday night, so we saw lots of Arsenal fans. And there were plenty of bachelor parties too.

Sunday we had planned to do the Van Gogh museum before we needed to head to the airport. And even though it was chilly and rainy, we trekked over to the Museum Quarter. Unfortunately, we weren’t the only ones with that idea. There was a huge line just to get tickets. Bummer. Major bummer. The VVG Museum was really the one thing that I wanted to do while we were there and we would have missed our flight if we had waited in it. They city did not seem crowded, and I never assumed that we would have needed tickets in advance, but now I know. Next time, I will book them online in advance.

Overall, it was a really nice, chill weekend. I loved strolling the canals – it felt like we were walking around a little neighborhood of dollhouses. See how cute it is: