Greetings from the Netherlands! We are really tired but happy to be here. Our Delta flight was very smooth and really could not have been better (in coach anyway). We were scheduled to depart at 1:30pm and backed away from the gate at 1:29. Impressive! We had good seats in the front just behind first class (although that means we had to look at them reclining back and enjoying their hot towels...) and our fellow passengers were a calm and pleasant bunch, with hardly any crying babies. We arrived a half-hour early, so the trip was only 9.5 hours instead of the usual 10. But it still felt like a really, really long time.
Not having to deal with baggage claim thanks to our smart packing, we sailed through the arrivals area at Amsterdam airport, but we had to walk really far from the gate to the airport train station. I was hating my heavy backpack, as I figured I would, but I think I will get used to it. We mastered the automated ticket machines fairly quickly and the train for Leiden was just arriving when we got to the platform. The train was fantastic – clean, smooth and quiet. We sat on the upper floor and had great views of flat green fields, canals, sheep and bicyclists.
After about 20 minutes on the train and a 10-minute walk, we arrived at our hotel (the Rembrandt) around 9am or so. Check-in time is 1pm, but the front desk clerk was very kind and accommodating and tried to get the housekeeper to hurry up cleaning our room so we could move in. We waited at a nearby McDonalds, which is big and bright with IKEA furniture and free Wi-Fi internet. David had a "Greek Mac" burger and I had a couple small cheeseburgers. Seems odd to have such food at 10 in the morning, but it felt like 1 in the morning to us!
Our hotel's lobby and restaurant are really cool but the room is just OK: it's very small and a bit run-down. And the Wi-Fi signal doesn't work in our room; I'm therefore blogging down in the restaurant/bar. But the room was the best I could find in Leiden, which just does not have a good selection of hotels (probably because most tourists stay in Amsterdam). Fortunately, we're so tired that we don't really care about much more than having a clean place to sleep! Leiden and Brussels are great and we're really happy to be back in Europe, but these first couple days are mainly just a limbo period to recover from jet lag and make our way to the UK. We are really excited to get there the day after tomorrow and pick up our car!
As soon as our room was ready we crawled into bed and napped for a few hours, which felt so good. It was really hard to get up, but we managed to do so around 3pm and walked around town for a couple hours. It had been raining all morning, but by the time we woke up the sun was shining beautifully and continued to do so the whole afternoon. It's a pretty pleasant temperature (I'd say 60-65 F), but quite windy. A few highlights of the walk:
"And when I'm in Holland I eat the pannenkoeken."
- Beastie Boys, Super Disco Breakin'
And finally tonight I got my Dutch pancake I've been looking forward to. It was pouring down rain again for our walk to the restaurant (and still is), but we tucked our cameras in our coats so we could share the meal with you! We went back to the same restaurant we visited just before coming home in 2008 (Oude Leyden) and it did not disappoint. After two airplane meals, two fast food meals and countless granola bars, it was really nice to have a good proper meal. So here are the inaugural food photos of Europe 2010:
And now, I get to go back to bed. Yay!!
Tomorrow: Brussels.