Amsterdam Chapter 2 (Zaanse Schans & The Canals of Amsterdam)

Hello people!, im sorry i took 500 light years to write again, so much going on..so i will save u guys from all the boring details of my life and get back to Amsterdam travel tales! . U can read chapter 1 here!

That morning 8th June 2015 we were the earliest who woke up, the party roomates were still asleep. as they were back so late last night. So we get ready as silent as we could. but u know the sound of bagpack zip unzip cant be avoided..haha.watever.

thin ghost has awaken! - in front of our hostel

We walk out from our hostel and walk towards the Amsterdam Central. We walk past by the Koninklijk  Peleis or Amsterdam Royal Palace in Dam Square. It was not open yet i guess. But if u r interested in going in, they sell tickets. I love to see Dam Square in the morning, so subtle.

fresh face lol!

Koninklijk  Peleis breezy morning

So we reached Amsterdam Central, as written in our itinerary 'Take NS Sprinter Train (Direction Uitgeest) platform 7a to Koog Zandijk ' . It was quite easy actually, we just ask and buy the tix, cos we have the right train and platform, so its easy.   TIPS: The platform must appear Uitgeest to ensure u r in the right direction.

this is the train NS Sprinter

20 min later, we arrived in Koog Zandijk.Their language is a bit like german, but dun worry as most of em can speak English well. Btw do bought return tix as well, easier. The price is around 6 euro 2 way.

The direction to Zaanse Schans is everywhere. U can also rent a bike if u dont wanna walk..We prefer walking. The weather is very freakin windy, so cold. Shit!..hahaha.. The pavement is so cute. They have this flower tiles that makes u feel welcomed. hehe.

the pavement :D

The area is very 'dutchy' . This is what i wanna see when we say 'Nederland'..haha.. I really really love this place. As u walk, u will see the dutch windmills, and this are real houses btw along the road to the windmill village. TIPS: Make sure ur smartphone / camera have enough battery as u WILL take lots of photos!

As we approach the windmill village, it gets more chilllly, the wind..my dear, gave me running nose. U need to walk on this bridge, above the river, it was soo pretty, the view, but cold of cos,.haha.

approaching Zaanse Schaans!

There are more than 10 windmills here, various colours. there are houses, people houses, some are wine and cafes, some are bookshop. Its very nice, me and Sarah was so in love of this place. Dont be so rushing, u know...just take a breath, walk slowly and enjoy the view. Swans, ducks, river, windmill..purrfect!

entering Zaanse Schaan, with Sarah leading and Nederland flag hanging, lol 

mmhmm there are ducks here

There were also souvenir shop, but u know the price is def higher than amsterdam. This one dutch guy sells his painting, it was quite nice, he try to sell to the chinese tourist, by speaking in Mandarin..hehe. yes lots of PRC btw. TIPS: if u want a good pics, do  not come during peak season or any season where mos tourist come. Cos they will conquer all. We arrive earlier than the big PRC group, so lucky us, got to enjoyed it before the 'invasion'.. lol.

see..not crowded :)...yet

We manage to take several sick pretty pics, lol..masuk bakul angkat sendiri. Sarah was like 'u take pic in wrong angle makes me look short' ...hihihi. But she is a hell of photographer tho, sick pics & videos below! :D #masukbaakulangkatsendiri

Tera and The Windmill

Sarah and The Windmill

LOVEEEEEE

Take your time here, sit and enjoy the view, the breeze. It's really calming. I really love his place.

We walked back to the train station and patiently waiting for the train. It was quite late. TIPS: Train will come with each gap around 20-30 minutes.

We managed to make friends with an american-pakistani couple. They were on their honeymoon across Europe. She said, 'america have all this actually, they copied amsterdam, denmark and all other places and make small towns out of it' ,.hahahaha

She was an immigrant before, from Pakistan. Now she is an American citizen staying in New York. A very happy girl she is, we talked alot also about our next plan to the UK. She said, their trip was reversed from us, start from UK, Amsterdam then Paris. lolzz. They bought the museum pass to visit as many museums they can in Amsterdam. We know about the pass.  But we didnt buy it cos we afraid we didnt have the time. But if you are a museum fan, that is a must for you.

Our train reached Amsterdam central, we say goodbye to the Pakistani couple. Instead of walking, we decided to buy the Tram 2 days pass. We bought it in Amsterdam Central. It was 7 euros. We walked out and trying to find the tram as per our itinerary.

the Trams in front of Amsterdam Central

We then hop into tram line 4 if im not mistaken. I show the ticket to the tram conductor, Sarah then lost the tix, my god. The conductor was like 'u must show ur ticket mam, if not u need to go back there and buy' *while driving the tram* . Sarah cant find it and we then walk to the back of the tram to buy new tix for Sarah. The tix IS so small btw, TIPS: put the ticket where u can find em easily!

The assistant at the back was so friendly tho, makes us laugh. After Sarah bough the tix, again..we stopped somewhere. I dont fucking know where we are at that time, as all buildings just look almost the same. We then hop on another train with hope that we will arrive in Westermarkt. We walked around but we ended up in Waterlooplein! .

Luckily Sarah have good memories on road, we walked back and we asked the tram conductor again and he said 'take the tram from the other side, same number' . We did, but we were going in circle. Lastly we stopped at Dam Square. These trams are sooo confusing homaigerdddd.. If not for Sarah memories, we will still be walking in circle, that tram this tram. If u r not sure, do not take the trams! Jus walked! pfft.. what waste of 7 euros, and 14 for Sarah..

However, lots of 'rent a bicycle' place here if u wanna travel the city using bicycle. I want to but Sarah are not sure and afraid if we got lost. make sense as well..so we walk :P

rent a bike!

we walk to Dam Square for lunch. We had lunch at this Mexico restaurant near our hostel. Actually the waiter who promote the shop was freakin handsome, with green eyes that we decided to eat there..hahaha.

the mexican restaurant

We had our lunch there, some nachos, some mexican pasta etc, the food was very good actually. We talked with the waiter, clearly he was interested in Sarah..hihihi.. He was from eastern europe actually, Macedonia if im not mistaken. Came to Amsterdam with his brother to work. All i can focus is his green eyes..lol. gediks :P . He said to us, I know i will see you girls again, cos we stay so near..so.. haha. But i know he wanna see Sarah more, ill kill Sarah.. lmao!

We then go to the famous Madame Tussauds Wax Museum. Cos Sarah have the free ticket from her friend who works at Legoland Malaysia, all of this parks are connected to each other under Merlin Entertainment. So, we got the pass.. The fabulous guy in the counter is so fun to talk too, he was like 'yo girls, travel so far, mmhmm'..'i bet its hot in Legoland, i heard its hot mmhmm' ..well u know, the way queen talks ;) . The staffs were so friendly.

We walk inside the museum, like damn it looks real. We saw Beyonce, Calvin Harris, Justin T, David Beckham (mmhmm) and lots more! It was so exciting!

We stopped at the session where a guy named Joseph (i guess) explained how they make the wax. He was one of the veteran employee there. He said they measured the exact same height and body shape of the real person. It takes longer to do stubbles and moustache for men.

Here's a few pics we have :D #narcisistic

well hello Becham..

Le Petit Reggae

I already do google maps using Wifi from the mexican restaurant. As we wanna go to Westermarkt. I print screen it to make sure we didnt got lost..lol. We follow it and somehow we manage to arrive at our destination..yeay! .. but yeah it was quite a walk.. but its okay, walk while experiencing amsterdam :) .

We saw Anne Frank Huis or Anne Frank House, u know the museum that become famous bcos of the movie 'The Fault in Our Stars'..hehehe . Its a museum of Anne Frank, a jew survivor from the war. The queue was soo long, we decided not to go in as it will be closing soon. Instead, we went for Canal Tour :D

the queueeeee

The Anne Frank Huis

The canal tour jetty is near the Anne Frank House. Amsterdam is known for city of canals, so why not tour it :D At first we wanna take the Canal bike cruise, but then Sarah are afraid if we fall into the canal..haha..i mean none of us know how to swim, so its kinda make sense.

the canal bike, 4 people will paddle it

Therefore, we just take the boats. There are several company that operates the tour, they also have the one that u can dine in while cruising, so choose wisely. We chose Local Amsterdam Tours. TIPS: u can check the type of tour or make online booking via http://www.localamsterdamtours.com/ . It cost us around 13Euros. It was worth it.

model sat for the canal tour

While waiting for the boat, we took pic with this stunning tower of westerkerk . Kerk means church in dutch and this is a tower of an old church.

westerkerk

We waited for about 20min i guess for the next boat to come. We hop on the boat, there were not many people as many booked the tour earlier, lucky us! The boat started moving, my gosh it was so cold, the breeze on the canals..watery nose. I was like, frozen for a while..lol

On the boat!

There were also speakers telling u where u r, but it was in Dutch and then translated in English. The headbphone, i dont know how to change the language, so watever.

It makes this one big round to the part where there are some modern buildings. We pass the RDL, the Oude Kerk etc, it was a great ride and a great way to see Amsterdam via its canal. You can also save lots of time! :) .

Canal tour

Modern part of Amsterdam

The tour stopped again at the starting place after almost an hour, so we walked back to our hostel. As usual my gps is Sarah, hihi.

My GPS..go straight for 5 minutes..hihi

We got back to hostel and rest, cos we were quite tired. Its getting colder around 8PM..oh my. The Britain girls, our roommates were there playing poker and drinking wine.  We were just resting on our bed. We will go out again in around 2 hours maybe, for dinner and walking around Red Light District, hihi :)

I actually fell asleep for half an hour i guess. haha..i woke up and no ones in the room already, except me and sarah. We were so happy as we can get ready easily..hihihihi. We freshen up and head out. We had our dinner at Wok to Walk, its pretty much asian delicacy fast food style. Packed with people as its cheap. Sarah looove it here. We sat in the corner and eat. I had some fish something..with rice and Sarah had prawn noodles. I like it here cos its warm..hihi

Wokkk

Then, we head to Red Light District. It was kinda scary ive to admit. Cos u dont see much girls tourist, mostly guys. As we all know prostitution and Weed is legal here, so u can see lots of bar selling seed, and apartment with glass windows with women marketing themselves. Im trying to figure out whether this is what the girls wanted to do voluntarily or they just simply have no choice. But, they are not harmed, so thats good, protected by law. Only men who r interested will approach the door. The girls will stay behind the glass.

this pic was taken secretly, cos u cant take pics openly here actually..

We walk from one alley to another, filled with drunk and party men, err not my fav place. We saw one guy got mugged i guess. The guy asked him to give money. That was so dangerous. TIPS: Do walk in groups a nigh around RLD please, for safety reasons.

We then decided to leave and hangout at Dam Square. I like it here, people riding bike, walking etc,,,so nice.

TIPS: please check left and right before crossing as theres a lot of Bicycles here and Trams on the road, there is a special lane for it next to pedestrian. So u must be careful esp when u wanna cross. One girl brake her bike cos i didnt saw her riding near me, i was like 'huh'..and walk away...she ride back and shout 'what the fok!'.. lol, must be british. Well my mistake as well cos i didnt say sorry, i was stunted..if she read this, then im sorry ! :D ..hihi.

We then go back to hostel and get some rest, it was a tiring day. Find out more on my journey in Chapter 3!