I spent a month bouncing around a few places in Europe recently, and kicked things off with a trip to Amsterdam. It's a city that I've had on my travel list since I was just a kid, and so it felt good to check this one off. Unfortunately, it was a rocky start to the trip. It seemed like everything that could go wrong with my flights did, and all said and done it took ~48 hours of travel from leaving Denver to actually arriving in Amsterdam. This disrupted a lot of my plans, but the silver lining is that the ticket cost was refunded. Free flight to Europe!

I was working the first few days that I was here, which was planned. From my research, I suspected that Amsterdam would be a lovely place to visit but that it wouldn't demand a lot of my attention. I'm past the clubbing and partying phase of my life, and don't have much interest in the unique recreational activities that Amsterdam provides. I'm also not a huge history or museum person. That rules out much of the major appeal for tourism in Amsterdam, which is why I haven't previously prioritized this city. But it was a great place to kick things off, and to settle in from the bad jet lag and transition from working to vacation mode!

Wait...that's not Amsterdam! I had an long layover in NYC due to flight complications, and snagged this photo while out for a stroll waiting on my next flight.
Ah, now that's more like it! This was from one of the main strips in Amsterdam.
This busker was performing on a side street, which apparently is illegal. A random passerby decided to start yelling at him for it, and they went back and forth for a while before the passerby gave up and moved along. I enjoyed the music; he was quite good!
As mentioned, the first few days in Amsterdam I was working. Here's a nice view from the Google office in Amsterdam. The city has so much greenery throughout it, so it was really nice to be able to feel the convenience of the city and still a connection to nature.
Amsterdam is well-known for being bike centric. And this wasn't overstated! Virtually every street had bike lanes, and the bikes outnumbered the cars by many multitudes.
I've seen a lot of cyclists, but this was the first I've seen someone side-straddling the bike like this. And it wasn't just a temporary thing, either! He rode this way as long as I could watch, both steering and peddling in this seated position.
I didn't realize how many photos I was taking in portrait orientation. I typically try to avoid them, since they can show up rather awkwardly on the blog posts. Something about the canals and streets seemed to lend itself to portrait, though.
One of the evenings, I went for a boat ride around the canal. It was a really pleasant experience. Thanks to the location of Amsterdam, the sun wasn't setting until 10 PM or so. That meant I had plenty of time after work to explore the city.
This particular location in the canals offers the most simultaneous views of bridges.
Once again, I think my favorite part about Amsterdam was the melding of nature and city. It was really nice to be able to stroll around and feel both like I was in a city and taking a walk through the woods. I could definitely see myself living here!
Here's some of the food that I snacked on in Amsterdam. The right was just some nice charcuterie and wine, and on the left is bitterballen. Those were an interesting concept: thick stew that's frozen, formed into balls, breaded and deep fried. Really good!