Back to Amsterdam

After grabbing some sleep, we made a quick run to Centraal Station in hopes of getting one last waffle before it was time to leave Belgium. No such luck; the waffle stand was closed, so it was back to the hotel for some snacks and coffee in our room before we checked out. Time to head back to Amsterdam!

Even with it being a Monday morning, the drive wasn't too bad...we didn't hit very much traffic, and we were back in the Netherlands before we knew it. We parked the car and grabbed a tram to our new hotel: 't Hotel. It sits right on a canal on a quiet street, and was much nicer than the first hotel we were in, a few blocks away. It was fantastic, and I'm definitely staying there again when I go back!

Since it was only early afternoon, we still had the rest of the day to enjoy Amsterdam before heading home to the US. We grabbed some lunch, then walked around for a while, doing some damage to our credit cards and buying lots of things. Mark eventually bought himself some extra luggage just so we wouldn't have to try to cram everything into the single checked bag we had brought with us. All that shopping was hard work, so we took a break for some waffles and ice cream.

*drool* Oh waffles, I'm going to miss you...

We were still a bit worn out from the past couple days, so we made our way back to the hotel to take a break and start rearranging our bags for the flight home the next day.

This is the view from our hotel room window. If our room had a little kitchen I probably would have tried to just move in for good.

We were watching a Dutch cartoon while we were repacking and such...it was pretty funny. The dog didn't want to get a bath and kept running away and was tracking mud all over the place.

After a while we were starting to get hungry, so we took a walk to go find some food.

Some of the buildings had graffiti...I liked this one.   :)

Since it was our last night in Amsterdam, we couldn't resist...we went back to The Pancake Bakery one last time.

I couldn't have asked for a nicer last dinner here. The weather was perfect and we managed to get a table outside right on the edge of the canal. We watched the boats cruise by while we ate, and Mark kept counting how many pictures we were going to be in as the canal cruise boats drifted by.

After dinner we wandered over to Dam Square one last time. The is the Royal Palace, where the abdication took place on our first day here. You can walk right up to the side of the building.

We sat in front of the National Monument for a little while and people-watched. The past couple days had been memorial holidays, and the wreathes that we had watched them place there on the TV broadcast in Belgium were still there.

We sat for a little while, then made a quick stop in a nearby store to wander around. We didn't realize until we got inside that it was basically a high-end department store crammed with designer clothing, accessories, and furniture. We had fun looking at how expensive everything was, then eventually started making our way back to the hotel. 

Bye, Royal Palace!

We made our way past several canals and enjoyed our last bits of time in Amsterdam along the way. The weather was so nice that I wish we could have wandered around a bit more, but we had a long day ahead of us and would need some sleep.

The view from in front of 't Hotel. I wouldn't mind living here.   :)