After that eventful night we did a little bit of extra sleeping in. We walked over to Coffee Fellows Рa caf̩ that was part of the train station Рand had some coffee and banana bread for breakfast. Then back to the hotel to organize and pack up our stuff.
We left our suitcase with the very nice receptionist/owner after checking out (I still feel bad for thinking he would do something to his guests) and we went back out into Hamburg to see some of the things we missed the first day.
First of all, it was now Monday and there were a lot more people out on the streets. To get away from the commuting crowds we walked to a different part of town (Poseldorf), on the other side of the Alster lakes. The neighborhood was quiet, and lined with older buildings that often contained foreign embassies and upscale real estate buildings. We walked up the main street at our own pace, stopping to take pictures of things that looked interesting. We ended our trek at a church that seemed like a good stopping point, and then on our way back dropped into a supermarket that had lots of great cheeses and vegetables – and the prices were very reasonable. I would love to shop and cook out of that supermarket – their foreign food sections were stocked with some great stuff.
Back closer to the city center we visited the Nivea store, and another branch of Flying Tiger (again – no luck with the crayfish napkins), and then back to St. Nikolai’s cathedral to take more pictures and poke around. This time we noticed that they had a display of the bells from the tower that was well done. For a brunch/snack we stopped for a couple of sandwiches – one was an egg remoulade, and the other was thinly sliced dried ham with a delicious slightly sweet dressing that really balanced well with the meat. Both were served on dark German bread rolls – yum!
Since we had about an hour to kill before our train to Amsterdam we went to the lakeside and found a café with outdoor seating and sipped prosecco while watching people passing by on their lunchbreak. The weather was cool and comfortable, and all it took was one look at my phone to see that back in Japan it was nearing record-breaking temperatures. It is nice to be able to get away from Japan’s summer, and we tried not to take that for granted while visiting each country on this trip.
Knowing that we’d be on a train for most of the rest of the day we stopped at the station to buy some supplies – more sandwiches and pieces of bread, with water and wine depending on how we felt. Kuniko picked out a really excellent roll that I wish I could remember the name of. From the outside it looked almost like pretzel dough, but it was more like a salted croissant with layers of butter dough and beautifully browned outside crust. Mind-blowing bread from bakeries of western Germany.
We followed the instructions in the station to where our train would arrive, but after a few minutes the instructions were updated to the other end of the platform, so we had to walk all the way to the opposite side of the station. When the train arrived we got on board and easily found our compartment. We were sharing the compartment with two nice older ladies who weren’t all that chatty and left us alone. We celebrated our departure with some of the delicious bread we had bought and headed west out of Hamburg and towards the border.
Our train was running about 10-15 minutes behind schedule, and we realized that this delay may impact our change to another train in Osnabruck. We had a ten minute buffer between the trains, so it was enough to make it an exciting connection. Kuniko was standing at the door ready to run for it as we arrived at the transfer station, but the door didn’t open very easily. The conductor stood behind us impatiently giving us instructions on how to open the door in German but for obvious reasons they weren’t very helpful. Finally the door opened and we ran for it – and we caught the next train with time to spare.
On this train we shared a compartment with a mother and daughter and a younger guy. The compartment was really hot and smelly, which was unusual. We initially thought the smell was from the young man (who had removed his sneakers to get more comfortable) but the smell continued after he left and we discovered that it was the young mother that was the source. The air conditioner wasn’t working very well, so we just had to deal with it – at least our seats were closest to the air vents.
Outside we passed the nearly invisible border into the Netherlands, and we saw even more modern windmills along the train route. It rained now and then – abruptly changing from blue sky to dark clouds and back again. Next to Kuniko the young daughter was asleep on the middle seat, and in her sleep she suddenly reached out to grab Kuniko, thinking she was grabbing her mother. Both Kuniko and the little girl were very surprised when they noticed what happened.
We arrived at Amsterdam Centraal at around 7 pm, and we needed to use our tickets to leave the platform, which was something new. In other European cities conductors check tickets on board, but here the system is similar to the Japanese style. We scanned our e-tickets from the screen of my smartphone, but since one e-ticket covered two people I had to hand my smartphone back over the gate to Kuniko so she could scan it again. Not so elegant.
From the gate we turned right and we walked just a short distance to our hotel for just one night – the IBIS hotel. The check-in was interesting because there was no check-in desk – we walked in the door and started looking around for the front lobby, and somebody called us from behind and said, “Are you checking in?” It was just a couple of people on barstools and high tables who do all the check-in procedures on their laptop. It is extremely casual, but something new which is always good. We took the elevator up and entered our TINY room. And when I say “tiny” this is coming from someone who lives in Japan and knows a thing or two about tiny hotel rooms. This was tiny even by Japanese standards. The bathroom was so small that you had to enter, turn your body 180 degrees, and then sort of fall down butt first onto the toilet seat to use it. But we were there only for one night, so no problem!
We walked into the center of Amsterdam, snapping pictures and very impressed with the canals, the picturesque buildings facing the water, and the quiet elegance of the city. I imagined smoke shops and sex parlors (and those are around) but there is a lot more to Amsterdam. We sort of walked around at random and found a place willing to serve us just a couple of glasses of wine at a table outside. The server was a really good looking guy who seemed to be lacking something essential in the cognitive department. We accepted his offer to bring bread and tapenade to go with our wine but it never materialized. When I paid with cash he said he lost track of his cash change box so I paid in credit instead. A little weird.
For dinner we went to a place that I had read about online called Lotti’s – it is in the basement of the Hotel Hoxton. The atmosphere was great – a younger vibe but still upscale, and we sat a big marble bar counter and ordered bitterballen (fried Dutch snacks to go with beer) and a platter of Dutch cheeses that were very delicious. There was a syrup that came on the cheese plate that was especially good. The staff said it was made by reducing apple cider and vinegar. We had good beer, too. One was called Funky Falcon – a pale ale from Two Chefs Brewing. We had their IPA and it was also pretty good. The staff all spoke English (I think our bartender was American, actually) and it felt like the entire bar/restaurant was designed to serve our demographic (whatever that happens to be).
On our way back to the tiny hotel room we did a shopping trip at a big supermarket branch of Albert Heijn. It was a comparatively larger market than what we’ve seen so far this trip, and we were shocked at how much cheese was available and how cheap it was. I started having visions of filling our suitcase of wheels of Dutch cheese.
It is looking like Amsterdam is going to be a fun and delicious city to explore!
