This is a tale from a long time ago – back around the year 2000 when I lived in San Jose with Sara, while working for several soon-to-be-extinct web companies.

Sara had started a concierge company to service startups around Silicon Valley, and part of her investment was buying season tickets to the San Jose Sharks NHL hockey team. We were already fans, so when she couldn’t use the season tickets for clients we got the chance to go and enjoy the games.

It was the first time for me to have a season ticket to any sports team, so it was a completely new experience. We saw the same people at the games, had access to special lounges, and one perk was that season ticket holders were tapped to volunteer at team promotional events, which brings me to today’s topic.

Every year the Sharks held a fan thank you event in their arena. The fans pay some fee and they come in and have a chance to join a long queue and meet their favorite players. There were some other attractions and drawings, and volunteers from among the season ticket holders were pressed into service to help out. Sara and I were happy to volunteer.

On the day of the event we arrived and were assigned In the morning to help manage the meet-and-greet autograph lines. My job was to stand next to some of the players sitting at a table and watch the fans to make sure that they didn’t wear out their welcome. The idea was that the line had to keep moving at a certain pace, so I would be the bad guy to ask people to wrap it up and move along. As a fan you’d hate to have the player you idolize tell you, “Great, now can you leave, please?” That job was left to the anonymous volunteer who had very little at stake. It was a really good idea. The players understood the arrangement and would give me a glance or a wink when they wanted me to move in, and surprisingly the fans took my hints quickly and moved on. Easy job, and it was fun to stand next to the players and overhear their side conversations.

In the afternoon after a lunch break the organizers mixed up the assignments, and I was sent onto the ice of the arena, to handle a booth set up so that fans could pay for the opportunity to take a shot on a real NHL goalie. My job was to take the tickets from the fans, set up the shot, and make sure the goalie had everything he needed.

The goalie I worked with was my favorite: Steve Shields (what a great name for a goalie!) At that time he was the backup goalie for the Sharks, and I liked him because he had recently been acquired from my other favorite team, the Buffalo Sabres. I was awestruck when he skated out and started to do warmup stretches in full gear in front of the net a couple feet away from me. Nobody else was on the ice but me and him.

There is something about standing next to an actual living, breathing professional athlete in the context of where they work. It seemed like he was a 3D person in a 2D world. It wasn’t just that he was on skates and wearing bulky pads that made Steve Shields seem larger – there is a self-confidence and professional aura that sports players, celebrities, and movie stars have, especially when doing what they are professionally paid to do.

A little nervously I went up and introduced myself and explained my function in this event. He answered in grunts that may have been from his stretches rather than any form of communication, but I figured this wasn’t the start of a deep relationship and I went back to my position to wait for the gates to open and more importantly stay out of his way.

Once the fans started streaming in, people quickly made their way down to the ice. Some had paid extra to shoot on goal, most were there just to be close to the Shark’s goalie. A large group of people gathered to watch, and I noticed there was a large part of the audience made up of beautiful young women, ooh-ing and aah-ing. Some of these ladies gave me things, which surprised me until they indicated that they wanted me to pass the presents on to Steve Shields, who accepted the gifts wordlessly and made a little pile behind the net. This was before selfies and smartphones but I don’t remember many people taking pictures at the event.

I set up the puck, gave a borrowed hockey stick to the eager fan in exchange for their ticket, and then they usually said something quickly to Steve before taking a whack at the puck. The goalie usually just nodded at whatever they said, easily blocked their shot, and tapped the puck back over to me – all in one smooth economic motion designed to ensure he didn’t injure himself outside of a real game.

In contrast to the other players that I had stood next to in the morning Shields was not very friendly. He didn’t talk to any fans, he didn’t really talk to me, and I got the vibe that he was stuck doing this event against his will. He blocked every shot taken on him, except for when little kids came up and then he did his best to let the shot trickle into the net. He may not have been happy to be there, but he did everything that he was supposed to do, and the fans kept lining up, and before I knew it the event was over.

As the last fans were ushered away by security, I realized that this was as close as I’d ever get in my life to shooting on a professional goalie. Steve was still in the net doing post-exercise stretches, and I was standing right there. I had the borrowed stick in one hand, and the puck and a handful of tickets in the other. So I did what seemed natural to me – I dropped the puck in front of me, put the stick on the ice, and flicked the puck over Steve Shield’s left shoulder and into the net.

Steve Shields looked up from his stretches, the puck already past him, and suddenly sprang to a standing position, facing me. He looked straight at me with that scary painted hockey mask. I didn’t move. Slowly he shook his head and without looking reached back behind him with his goalkeeper stick, retrieved the puck, and sent it out of the net (and away from me).

There was an awkward silence as he stood there facing me, in full uniform, while I stood there looking back (probably with my mouth hanging open) wondering if I had pissed him off.

But then he skated towards me, tapped the side of my leg with his stick, and said “Thanks” before skating off towards the dressing room.

I learned that day that goalies (at least the ones that I have worked with) are extremely serious about protecting the goal, even when they aren’t in a game and that maybe I had broken an unwritten hockey rule.

So that was how I scored a goal on a (unaware) NHL goalie, learned a little lesson on the rules of fair play, and had a glimpse of the parts of a pro athlete’s life that you rarely get to see.

But I can truthfully say that still, to this day, no NHL goalie has managed to block a shot by me. I think it’ll probably stay that way.

We awoke to the sound of sea gulls squawking outside. I realized that during this trip we were never far from the ocean and the sound of sea gulls had been following us around. We checked out of our last hotel and made a somewhat morose trip to the train station for the last time. We were both thinking of heading back to the sweltering heat of Japanese summer. Our phones showed us the high temperatures there, a typhoon had come through (we were happy to find out later that it didn’t cause any damage to our neighborhood), and leaving all this free air conditioning behind seemed like a bad idea. Our summer trips are something we look forward to all year long, and it is always a little sad to wrap them up.

At Amsterdam Schiphol airport we got checked in right away, and even found some individually wrapped stroopwaffels to take back for students. We bought a few goodies for the plane ride, and then caught a late morning flight to Singapore on Singapore Airlines. I took full advantage of the video system and watched five or six movies and the 13 hours just flew by.

In Singapore we went ahead and waited an hour to get through immigration, entered the country officially, and then went to the Jewel area. Although we were there very early we could see they spent a lot of money on the space. There was a two part dramatic waterfall in the center, surrounded by shops, restaurants, and a small jungle of real plants growing in a greenhouse-like environment.

We eased the shock of going back to Asia by having a small dim sum breakfast at a Chinese restaurant. We ate spicy noodles (dry – no soup), boiled nuts and even a couple of charcoal black salted egg buns. Back inside security we ate some laska and a lotus bun, and then started to get really sleepy waiting for our final flight. We were like zombies in the lounge drifting in and out of sleep, and then it was time to go home to Osaka.

Once we arrive at Kansai Airport they open the plane door, and when you walk out of the plane you get that first blast of summer humidity in the boarding gate tunnel – then you know it is for real. We came back to our home late but the house was fine, the garden was a little scorched but basically alive, and we prepared to go back to work on Monday.

Before our trip we wondered if there was going to be any problems – any trouble that we’d have to overcome during the journey. I’m happy to report that other than an imaginary hotel room invasion and some slightly wet jeans it went just fine. We traveled through countries that are easy to deal with.

Now we’re starting to consider next year’s destinations, and looking forward to a trip to Malaysia and perhaps Sri Lanka in December. We love going on trips, but doing the planning and imagining the places you could go is a lot of fun too.

Thanks for following along on this adventure!

We got up a little earlier than usual, showered, and were out the door by 7 am. Today we had plans to do some traveling around the country to see more than just Amsterdam. First stop was the train station, and we were able to use the (cheaper) e-tickets that we downloaded the previous night to get through the gates. We caught a “Sprinter” class train to take us out of town towards the much smaller town of Gouda. I wanted to visit Gouda because previously we had visited some cheese towns (Cheddar, Gruyeres) and it is fun to eat lots of cheese directly from the source.

The train wasn’t so crowded since we were traveling in the opposite direction of the commute. All the announcements were only in Dutch, but there was a video screen so we could figure out where we were. Once we got outside the city limits, the train passed more and more pastures. The farther we went the more sheep, cows, and windmills started to show up. The pastures were often divided by narrow waterways instead of fences, so if the animals felt brave enough to swim they could move on to greener pastures, I guess. About 45 minutes after leaving Amsterdam we got off the train at Gouda station. The timing here was important because I had read that there is a cheese market held every Thursday at 10 am, and it can get quite crowded. Originally I had considered sleeping overnight in Gouda before the market, but later I was glad that we didn’t.

The town of Gouda is built in kind of circle with a central church in the middle, similar to many European small towns. The train station is along the outer ring of the circle, and our destination was along the main street right in the center of town. Hanging above the main street were decorative plastic wheels of cheese – a little hint into what we were getting into. We reached the central square, and despite the threatening clouds there were some tents being set up and some food stands getting ready to serve, so we had come to right place. At the center of the square was the town church, and it was quite dramatically designed with an interesting castle-like structure, red and white painted window shutters, and some huge flags waving from one side. Surrounding the church was the town square with lots of touristy shops similar to what you’d find around the Sonoma Plaza.

We walked around the square, had a small cheese waffle to warm up, and dodged rain showers when they came. Each spell of rain didn’t last long, and in between we walked to other parts of town to see a church or a windmill here and there. Eventually it came closer to the market time, so we wandered back to the square and found a long row of cheese wheels set out on boards in front of the church, covered with plastic sheets to keep them dry. By now the stands selling cheese were open, but they weren’t giving out samples – just selling cheese wedges or small wheels. I was hoping to try more things, but it seemed like these cheeses were similar to the ones we had been sampling (extensively) back in Amsterdam.

The opening of the cheese market was signaled by the appearance of some beautiful black horses drawing a few wagons, an old guy wearing a completely yellow suit, some other old guys wearing blue jackets, and some old guys wearing white aprons. In addition there were a couple of young women wearing Dutch clogs and traditional clothing. The old guy in the yellow suit turned out to be the emcee, and he went through the introductions in 4-5 languages, so the intro took a while. Then the old men in blue jackets each lined up in front of a pile of cheese wheels across from an old man in a white apron. The faces of the old guys gave away the game – some of them looked slightly hungover but all of them looked like they do this every week and there is very little at stake. Each pair were supposedly buyer (the man in blue) and seller (the main in the white apron), and they met and negotiated the price of the cheese (of course in Dutch so I’m not sure what was said). The negotiation included a ritual of slapping hands, which was about the only thing we could understand, and they just did it over and over again – perhaps coming closer to an agreeable price?

Quickly I (and I’m sure the rest of the growing audience) realized that this is not a real market but kind of a dramatization, and that we were watching a show, and it got old quickly. The market was a means to attract tourism to the town, and these old guys were doing their civic duty by playing the parts.

So the market wasn’t a big deal for me and Kuniko and I started to look for a source of cheese, and a lot of it. The sellers weren’t interested in giving out samples, and I asked one seller where I could go if I wanted to try a lot of cheese – was there a restaurant somewhere? A cheese shop? Their response: “I don’t know”. The square was filling up with a remarkable amount of people (they must have been coming in by the busload) so there seemed to be plenty of demand.

We did a quick perusal of the restaurants around the square and did find one that had a lot of cheese on the menu. We sat together on one side of a table under an umbrella – the other side was slightly exposed to the rain that was still falling now and then. I ordered what was called a “Gouda 12 o’clock” which included Gouda soup, eggs with Gouda on toast, and Gouda croquettes. Kuniko ordered a Gouda cheese sandwich but we somehow received a toasted cheese panini by mistake – we didn’t notice until it was too late and ate it anyway. My meal was pretty tasty, but I was hoping the town of Gouda would provide a better way to eat an insane amount of cheese while we were there.

One minor disaster occurred while I went inside the restaurant to pay the bill after our meal. Someone came to sit at the table behind ours, so Kuniko thoughtfully moved and sat at the seat on the other side of our table to give them more space to sit. When I came back after paying the bill Kuniko stood up and we left, and we noticed that Kuniko’s jeans had adsorbed quite a bit of water from the wet seat she had briefly occupied. Thankfully because of the rain it was hard for people to notice that Kuniko was sporting a big wet spot on the seat of her pants.

Things improved dramatically when we stopped at a Flying Tiger store on the way out of town. There we finally found the crayfish cocktail napkins that had been eluding us since Iceland. A big burden was off my shoulders at that point.

Back to the train station, and we caught a short train ride (using a discarded newspaper as an absorbent seat for Kuniko) to visit The Hague, called Den Haag in Dutch. I had often heard of the city in the context of the United Nations, and since it was so close we thought it might be a nice way to spend the afternoon. The Hague had a completely different feel from Amsterdam. Amsterdam felt loose and young and a little wild, while The Hague was more clean, straight-laced and dignified somehow. The streets here were much wider and easier to walk, since there aren’t as many canals to work around.

We started with a visit to the Mauritshuis Art Museum. We bought tickets easily and then went inside the beautifully decorated building. The way it was designed was like you were visiting the house of a rich uncle and checking out his art collection. The interior was a central staircase with marble steps, and walls tastefully decorated in a Victorian style with rich shades of red and blue to go with the dark wood panels and floors. The collection itself was impressive with the centerpiece being “Girl with a Pearl Earring” by Johannes Vermeer. Surprisingly there weren’t that many people in the room checking out the original, so we could get close and admire it at our leisure.

At the time of our visit there was a class of schoolkids learning about art, and their teacher was quizzing them on the art that was on the wall while they answered and asked questions. It looked like the best art class ever. At the end we walked through the souvenir shop, and they had plenty of really goofy/playful souvenirs for sale. We managed to avoid doing any shopping there.

We took a break after the museum to sit outside on a square and have a glass of wine. The weather here was more sunny than rainy, but rain did occasionally fall. The server at the restaurant we visited was the nicest guy – I felt like the quality of service was really high in our experience on this trip. People are very friendly, and it is not because they are angling for a tip.

From there we walked quite a ways to go see the Peace Palace. It is a dramatic palace housing the International Court of Justice, among some other organizations. The entrance was a little hard to find, and believe it or not we walked almost completely around it before arriving at the front gate. When we arrived the sign said that admission was free, however they weren’t letting anyone in at that time. Rather than wait around for an undetermined time we moved on – so much to see!

We tried to visit one more palace closer to the city center, Noordeinde Palace, but due to security or bad directions we couldn’t access the central area to see the front of the building, only the back. I think we probably made a wrong turn in there somewhere. The palace is the home of some Dutch royalty, so it might be hidden for a reason.

On the way back to the train station we avoided a sudden rain squall by ducking into a French fries place. French fries were recommended as a traditional Dutch food, and we had ours with a healthy dose of curry sauce. They were so delicious! I was going to skip the fries because I thought they aren’t so different than fries in any other country but they were cooked perfectly and the curry sauce really balanced with the soft potato filling. Wow!

Once the rain subsided we continued on, walking through big city parks on wide walking lanes, with historic streetcars rolling by now and then. It was a quiet city, but quite large and very comfortable. I’m glad we visited it to really understand the contrast with Amsterdam. I’d recommend using a car or public transport in a city as big as The Hague, though.

We took a train back to Amsterdam, and then walked all the way back to the restaurant where we started, Lotti’s in the basement of the Hotel Hoxton. We knew it was a good place to hang out and we wanted to have our last meal in the Netherlands be a good one. We ordered a bowl of smoked eggplant dip, a loaf of nut-encrusted sourdough bread, another platter of cheese, and several big glasses of beer. While we ate we talked about our impressions of the cities and countries that we had visited this time. It is always amazing to think about how long ago it was when we first started the trip, and we had fond memories of that first pub back in Dublin when we were so exhausted we could barely stand. At the end of the dinner I had a glass of port to continue the celebratory mood.

Back at the hotel we did some packing, choosing the stuff to bring back and the stuff to throw away, and got ready to head to Asia early the next morning.

Just like other summer trips, we’ve been doing a lot of walking. Towards the end of the trip we can start to feel it in our legs, and today we decided to sleep in and enjoy the big comfortable hotel bed a little bit longer. Our goal today was to try out some Dutch sweets so we anticipated a high calorie morning.

We started with a cup of coffee at a café called “Brasil”. Our original plan was to go to another place but it turned out they were filming a TV commercial inside so we had to go to our backup coffee shop. We were killing time until a stroopwaffel store opened up at 10 am. To use up more time we went to the local Albert Heijn supermarket to do some shopping for souvenirs and there we found one of the traditional sweets we wanted to try, the formidable boschball, which was basically a giant chocolate-covered creampuff. With a couple of boschballs in our grocery bag we went back to the stroopwaffel place and ate a freshly baked one prepared by the friendly lady working there. She didn’t mind letting us in a little early, and we had some more coffee with the intensely sweet but very delicious warm stroopwaffel. For added decadence we asked her to paint some Nutella on one side – wow! We brought our boschballs back to the hotel and ate them there while planning the rest of our day. I thought the boschball was a little too sweet for my taste – but I don’t think they are the kind of desserts that you eat every day. At this point I think we had already hit our daily recommended calories.

To burn some of those calories we decided to walk around town some more. We started at the somewhat disappointing Amsterdam Cheese Museum. Again, I was hoping for some education but instead we found a cheese shop with a small basement lined with some old cheesemaking equipment and some broken video screens that apparently were supposed to provide the educational info. We left a little disappointed, and then started a long circuitous route to the southeast and then northwest. We stopped for brunch at a little café. They had draft beer taps prominently displayed at the bar, but unfortunately they only served bottled beer. Kuniko got stuck with a bottle of Heineken, which even in Amsterdam tasted pretty much like Heineken anywhere else. We ordered some light food (Kuniko: lentil salad with parmesan cheese, avocado and poached egg, Bryan: panini sandwich with fontina cheese and prosciutto). While we waited for our food a mini-van pulled up outside, and a small group of Korean people got out. There were two cameramen, two make-up artists, and two or three VIPs. Don’t know who they were, but they did some shopping and the other staff had to wait around a bit. They ended up eating at our café, and I watched the makeup artists working on the VIPs while they waited for their lunch. Weird!

I was feeling pretty blissed out – sipping beer in the morning and riding a sugar high in a beautiful city far from the broiling Japanese summer. After brunch we walked a little more through the parts of Amsterdam we hadn’t visited yet. We saw a couple of historic drawbridges while hearing the bells of nearby churches, visited a local bakery and had a sausage roll served by a polite young man who looked excited to be able to use English with us. Our walking course ended near the northeastern part of Amsterdam at the only windmill inside the city. We were there to see the windmill, but also conveniently (and probably not coincidentally) there is a local microbrewery right next to it, so you can sit outside drinking local beers while contemplating the giant old windmill.

Crossing the street to the brewery we had to be careful of bicycles. One bicycle passed in front of us as we were about to cross and we held up just in time. The very attractive rider with blue hair looked at us and smiled as we stayed out of her way. An old lady crossed the street behind us carrying a poop-shaped pillow. We were in an interesting neighborhood.

The brewery we visited, Brouweri ‘T IJ, opened at 2 pm, and we arrived a few minutes early. There was quite a few other people waiting for it to open, sitting at picnic tables outside under an arbor of vines for shade. I noticed that next door was a brewpub (not a brewery) that was open earlier, to scavenge customers of the microbrewery who arrived too early. Once the brewery opened at 2 pm, there was a bit of a scramble as people lined up to get drinks and the bartenders poured as fast as they could to meet demand. There was even some pushing and cutting among the customers – they were serious about their beer. We ordered a tasting flight of five beers, and also a pint of IPA made with mosaic hops. All the beers were OK, although a little thin. The standout beer was a brown ale called “Colorado” that was really tasty.

After enjoying our beer we walked back towards the train station, walking on the waterfront and enjoying the views of the city. Again, beautiful architecture in both modern buildings and the classical-style buildings. Especially interesting was the Maritime Museum that was built on the water shaped like the prow of a sinking ship. I also was interested in a Chinese restaurant built on its own island in the harbor – to get there you needed to find a water taxi. It was a three story building in the Chinese style, and for some reason reminded me of the James Bond movies.

When we reached the train station we looked into buying train tickets for our trip to Gouda and The Hague the next day. The tickets seemed really expensive, so we checked on buying them online. Downloading e-tickets turned out to be much cheaper, so we decided to follow that course instead. For dinner we made it an eat-in at the hotel night. At the supermarket we bought all the stuff we’d been drooling over – goat cheese with coriander, roasted ham, herb crackers, a salad of grilled vegetables and sun-dried tomatoes, and another salad with kebab meat, couscous and cucumbers. Along with two local beers and some prosecco we partied in our room and enjoyed an evening in.

Amsterdam is not an easy to city to walk around. First, the canals line most of the streets so as long as you are walking north and south it is not a problem. Traveling east or west means finding a bridge and so it takes a bit longer. In addition, Amsterdam also uses the bike lane system, so you need always be aware of bikes passing and to make sure you don’t accidentally step in front of one.

However, walking the city provides for some beautiful sights. I took so many pictures of the canals and the narrow houses lining the streets, and occasionally we’d discover some ancient gothic church or very modern design studio that really stood out.

We started our sightseeing tour by walking all the way to the south, towards the museum district and flower market. We didn’t have any plans to enter any museums but just to walk around the area. The first museum you see when you arrive is the Rijksmuseum which straddles a bike lane and pedestrian path. It is a very large building, housing various works including quite a bit of Rembrandt. Beyond that is the Van Gogh museum, and other smaller museums nestled among gardens and parks. The garden behind the Rjiksmuseum is especially creepy – there were little pillars with bronzed body parts, giant spiders, and creepy stainless steel beehives hanging from trees. Don’t visit at night! We also made an early visit to the flower market which was only just starting to open. The tulip season is over by summertime, but somehow they dug up some flowers to sell to the tourists. I was surprised to see they were even selling marijuana seed kits to take home.

At one point we were heading north to see a particular church – and we had to cross a busy street. There was construction going on nearby, and a big truck was blocking the crosswalk so you had to peek around the truck to see whether the light was green or red. We peeked around, saw green, and started to cross, but less than two seconds later the light changed to red. The crossing lights in Amsterdam don’t blink a warning – they just instantly change to red. Lesson learned but at the wrong time – Kuniko was a little ahead of me and caught flat footed in the middle lane as a big dumptruck revved up its engine and turned into the street aiming right for us. I’ll never forget Kuniko’s reaction – she froze, kind of crouched, and threw her hands out in both directions as if saying “Which direction should I go?” Luckily the driver stopped his truck and allowed us to live – but we learned a hard lesson about crossing the street in Amsterdam.

Since we survived a near-death experience we decided to go celebrate life by eating breakfast. We found a little caf̩ that had outdoor seating on a busy intersection, and we sat outside sipping our coffees. Each coffee was served with a little miniature stroopwaffel (two thin waffles sandwiching a layer of caramel syrup Рapparently a famous product of the Netherlands). I ordered some eggs and avocado on toast, and Kuniko had a big omelet, and we chewed our food happily, watched people walking by on the way to work, and considered the fragility of life.

It was getting close to check out time back at our tiny hotel, so we made the trek back to the room, packed up and checked out at the little bar counter in the lobby. It was a ten minute walk or so to our next hotel – the Inntel Hotel – which we’d use for the last three nights remaining in our summer trip. Fortunately the hotel was a really nice one, and our room was quite large. This was a nice upgrade to the rooms we’d stayed in so far, and a nice way to end the trip.

After settling in we left to go out and find some lunch. I had read online about a food hall (called FoodHallen) and it was also recommended by a friend who had visited Amsterdam the previous week for the Pride festival. We walked across town to find it, and it turned out to be pretty nice. We’d seen a similar food hall in Prague during previous trips, and apparently it is a popular trend. The fall was filled with small restaurants, serving international foods. When we visit a new city we try to focus on local foods – so most of the foods in the food hall were a little different from what we wanted to eat. It felt strange to go to the Netherlands and eat Mexican food, pizza, or sushi. There was one stand featuring bitterballen with different kinds of filling. We ordered some with meat filling, and some with truffle cream. Also we had some truffle mayo on the side, just in case we weren’t getting enough truffle in our diet. Together with two local beers they went down nicely.

After this very light lunch we got the bright idea to go cheese tasting. There are a ton of cheese shops around the city – mainly branches of Old Amsterdam, Henri Willig, and then some generic cheese companies selling various brands of cheese. We started at Old Amsterdam, and at each store they had samples of cheese out in front of the wedges they were selling. Right away we noticed that the cheeses they were selling were about triple the price of the same cheese we had found the previous night at the local supermarket, so we were there just for tasting. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much in the way of education in the shops. I wanted to learn more about what makes their particular cheese products special. The staff I talked to were a little grouchy and I think they were shell-shocked from dealing with so many tourists all day. Still, it was fun to try to varieties of cheese that we hadn’t seen before – Old Amsterdam makes a creamy goat cheese that was tasty.

Nearby we found a Flying Tiger store, but again we couldn’t find Kuniko’s crayfish cocktail napkins. I really blew it in Reykjavik, didn’t I? As we left Flying Tiger a sudden rainstorm came through. We were dealing with these storms the whole time we were in the Netherlands. The rain would come, stay for 5-10 minutes, and then disappear and we’d get sun. We decided to wait out the rain sipping red wine at a table with a big umbrella, and it was a nice little break.

At breakfast we had been served coffee with a little mini individually wrapped stroopwaffel, and we thought that it was a perfect size for a souvenir to take back to our students. We shopped around for some to bring back to Japan, but mainly in Amsterdam they sold stroopwaffels in large sizes, about 8 to a pack. We have way too many students and not enough suitcase space to bring back those, so our long search began to find the source of the mini-stroopwaffel.

For dinner that night we found a restaurant serving local food in a little bit of a touristy part of town. Finding local food is surprisingly difficult – there were an inordinate amount of shops run by Middle Easterners selling pizza/doner kebab/steaks/ribs. It was like a template – these restaurants always served the same things at the same prices. But the place we found had a local dish called stamppot (mashed potatoes mixed with sausage and topped with a meatball). I ordered chicken skewers with a satay peanut sauce, and it was delicious and very refreshing. This was the first time we’d eaten chicken in almost two weeks. There is an Indonesian connection in Amsterdam because Indonesia was originally colonized by the Dutch and a fair amount of culture was transferred between them, and I often saw satay dishes on menus. Anyway, that was my rationalization for eating a slightly Asian dish in the Netherlands.

We walked from the restaurant up through the wild district, with clouds of marijuana smoke coming from various “coffeehouses” and went to check out the Waag, an old building that used to serve as the city gate of Amsterdam. Nearby there was a pretty large historic church, surrounded on all sides by the red light district. We found a place with outside dining to have a couple glasses of wine and realized we were surrounded on all sides by buildings that had big windows in the front, and a red light over each one of them. We were there early and most of the windows were dark, but as we left a few windows were occupied with (somewhat scary looking) women wearing only underwear and leering at passersby.

Suddenly we got caught in another flash rainstorm, so we made a dash for the nearest convenience store for supplies, and then went back to our nice big comfortable hotel room to call it a night. 35,000 steps – another big hiking day.

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!

Since it was our last night at the Absalon we got up early to take advantage of their great breakfast. We arrived a few minutes before breakfast was officially served. The staff were a little grouchy about it, but they let us tuck in to our meal and get started.

We checked out and rolled our suitcase down the street to the train station, but this time around the front instead of the side entrance closest to our hotel. There were a few broken bottles on the street and we walked by a slightly scary-looking guy smoking on the steps – he was glaring at the ground but he looked up when we went by. I smiled and said good morning, and he gave me a big smile back and returned our greeting. Looks can be deceiving.

Usually we would take a train out of Copenhagen to get to our next city, Hamburg, but there was some construction on a train bridge in between, so the Danish rail company was providing a substitute bus service to bypass the construction. At the train station there was a bus already waiting, and we showed our tickets to the driver to get on board. At first there was only one bus, but another one arrived and started accepting passengers first – which caused a lot of unnecessary chaos among the confused passengers – which bus? Where does each bus go? I was first in line here but now I’m last in line over there – lots of confusion.

We got a front seat on the first bus out, sitting right in front of two people who Kuniko thinks were a Chinese mafia member and his wife. They smelled strongly of body odor – I needed to direct the air vent right at my nose to avoid the smell. Another slightly alarming thing was I noticed that the bus driver was a little shaky. Not only were his hands shaking but also his neck and head. Just from our viewpoint he seemed to be able to handle driving the big bus – actually, the fact that it was such a big vehicle probably helped him out a bit – but I wonder if the disease will progress into something worse. In my head I considered what would happen if we made a complaint later on to the management of the rail service. After all, if we are paying to be professionally transported we ought to have a driver that is in top physical condition. But then I thought about the driver himself – he was around my age and he obviously knows what is happening to his body, maybe he doesn’t have a lot of other career options (especially with a physical disease like that), and a complaint from passengers might be enough to cost him his job and perhaps put him in a precarious position economically. I turned the issue over in my head during the drive – some moral issues to help the time go by.

The bus ride was about two hours south to the coast and the port town of Rodby. We drove through mostly farm land, and we were able to see a lot of windmills. Not the old wooden kind, but the modern green energy type. There were some real monster windmills out there, and they stretched off into the distance as far as we could see. I was impressed that they went all in on green energy in Denmark. When we finally arrived at Rodby we got off the bus, got our suitcase, and then walked over to a train platform nearby. It was a very windy day (I could see why they have so many windmills) and in the distance was a group of goats head-butting each other in the field. It took about 30 minutes for the two-car train to arrive, and then we got on board. Again it was a chaotic boarding – but everyone got their seats and Kuniko ate some marzipan sweets (that we had bought all the way back in Ireland) to keep our energy up. We were sitting in first class so the seats were spacious and very comfortable.

From here things got interesting. The two train cars filled with passengers then proceeded a very short distance to the ferry dock and rolled right on to the rails inside the ferry. Once the rail cars were inside, cars and trucks drove in and parked next to the train cars. Once all the cars had parked, the doors of the train were opened, and we could proceed up to the top floors of the ferry. The ferry was multi-level – there were two other floors above us that also had cars, so that gives you a sense of the size of the ferry we were on.

Similar to the ferry we took from Helsinki to Tallinn, there was plenty to do onboard during the voyage. There were shops, restaurants, bars, and entertainment areas that had slot machines and other forms of gaming. Topside you could outside, but it wasn’t quite as much space as the Helsinki/Tallinn run. Since we had 45 minutes of sailing time, we bought some sparkling wine and French fries at the cafeteria, and sat near the front window and watched the coastline of Germany approach slowly. We had nice seats, and we shared our table with an older couple who didn’t speak English – but we managed to communicate with smiles and gestures. Out the window to our left (east) there were even more windmills forming a line offshore – there were some huge ones out on the sea.

About five minutes before arrival an announcement was made and we generally understood that it was time to go back to the train. We boarded the train (which had been locked up during the trip) and soon enough it moved off the ferry and on to German soil under its own power. For some reason there was delay of about ten minutes, and then we moved off towards Hamburg. From the ferry to Hamburg it was about a two hour train ride, but we made it in comfort in first class.

During the train ride I had a chance to overhear an interesting conversation from the people sitting a few seats away from us. They were an older New Zealand couple who were explaining to someone sitting near them about their travels. For the last six months they had been traveling around Europe, visiting various countries and living out of two suitcases. Apparently her hobby is making lace, so they have traveled to cities famous for lace-making, and the husband is into photography so he’s been documenting everything. The couple asked the passing train conductor to help them with their next train connection, and they quizzed him for almost ten minutes on the best way to go about it. Their seatmate got involved, and soon new options were coming up and everyone had an opinion. I’m not sure I’d like traveling with that kind of uncertainty – taking a poll from people who happen to be sitting next to you. I guess we’re more like “surgical strike” travelers.

Eventually the train arrived at Hamburg Central Station, and we walked through on our way to find our hotel. The station was big and busy – lots of shops everywhere (especially bakeries!) and the design was a nice combination of modern and traditional. Our hotel was very close to the station. We walked across a street, turned left, and entered a neighborhood that looked like Old Dubai in the UAE. There were lots of doner kebab shops, Middle Eastern grocery stores, two or three strip clubs, some homeless people laying on the street, and groups of men in traditional Arabic clothes here and there. And our hotel was tucked into an alley between all of that.

The front door of Hotel Terminus was locked. You needed to push a button to alert the front desk, and then they buzzed you in. We walked straight through a hallway to an unusual elevator that had two doors on a 90 degree angle from each other. The elevator doors opened and then you walked down half a flight of steps to find the check-in counter. The Middle-Eastern receptionist (and owner, I think) checked us in early despite our arrival time, and gave us a room on the second floor. He was the friendliest guy ever, and I really got a good vibe from him.

We took the elevator to the second floor, and found our room to be quite large, comfortable and very clean. Our hotel door had only a key lock that was a little difficult to manage. There was no other deadlock or chain, and no peephole to see outside, so you really needed to get the key turned correctly. The bathroom door was right next to the front door, and for some reason it wouldn’t close completely – it would stick in the doorway so you had to pull and pull with all your strength until finally it clicked closed.

Anyway, despite these small annoyances the hotel room was clean, cheap, and it was only for one night, anyway. We left our baggage behind and went out to do some sightseeing.

There is a lot to see in Hamburg. It is really easy to walk around as people obey every traffic signal (unlike in Dublin), there are broad streets with plenty of room to walk, and beautiful architecture around every corner. In the distance there are huge church steeples that make navigation easier even without a map. We especially liked seeing the Rathaus (the city hall building), the canal area (Speicherstadt) which is made up of many old warehouses of red brick separated by water canals, and the Elbphilharmonie building – a very modern amphitheater built on its own island in the Hamburg harbor.

We came to Hamburg for the sights but also for the food, so we stopped at a tasty looking restaurant for beer and snacks. We had a plate of potato pancakes, and I had two big potato dumplings (sprinkled with big chunks of bacon). I picked a beer at random from the menu and ended up with a sweet beer (ick), but the other beer we chose was much better, called Duckstein.

After snacking we continued looking around the city. We saw St. Michael’s church which also had a beautiful interior, and then walked through a city park down to the waterfront and walked along the harbor. Since it was Sunday it seemed like all the locals from the city were walking on the promenade and enjoying the sunny, cool weather. There were people in costumes trying to make some money off the crowds – we even saw a fake Olaf character from Frozen who was a little creepy. Throughout the city we could see an elevated train system, so public transport in Hamburg was quite good. As we walked along the busy promenade we could see out across the harbor to the other side where they had built some buildings to house plays – the Lion King and Mary Poppins each had their own (permanent?) theater. Hamburg is an impressive city for architecture – I kept saying it over and over while we were there. We often saw the symbol of Hamburg, a red flag with a white castle on it flying from buildings, and even on manhole covers. The people of Hamburg are obviously proud of their city.

For dinner we wanted to try a local dish, so we went to a restaurant called Das Kontor (across from the potato pancake restaurant we had been to earlier). I had a fried pork cutlet (with a fried egg on top) and Kuniko had the local dish called Labuskaus. When it arrived it looked like a pile of raw minced pork topped with two fried eggs, but under the eggs is actually pureed sausage and potatoes – everything is cooked. It also had a bowl of fried potatoes on the side. Very good, but also very filling. We had been eating a lot of carbohydrates on this trip so we could only eat about half of Kuniko’s dish. Why did I order French fries on the ferry?

After dinner we walked back to the hotel but also visited a few locations that had impressive architecture. One was St. Nikolai Cathedral, a huge cathedral that had been bombed during World War II. The bulk of the cathedral was missing – only the tall lonely spire remained but it could be seen from just about everywhere in Hamburg. We also saw the interestingly named Chilehaus,

We got back to the hotel, and I was completely stuffed with potatoes, beer, and sausage so I ended up going to bed fairly early. Thanks to indigestion I didn’t sleep soundly and was tossing and turning while trying to fall asleep. Our hotel room had separate twin beds so at least I wasn’t bothering Kuniko.

While drifting in and out of sleep the noise of people talking outside drifted through our open window. Some people down on the street started shouting and I started to think about whether I trusted our hotel door or not. This was a very small, very cheap hotel – what if someone tried to break in? It was silly to think about it, but I was half asleep and full of potatoes and very tired. At some point during the night someone entered the room above us, and I could hear their footsteps as they walked around. Later somebody broke a bottle outside and it was surprisingly loud. What if the friendly hotel guy told his friends outside that there were two easy marks up in room 209? The hotel was called “Terminus” – that had a note of finality, didn’t it? Ridiculous thoughts!

Eventually I got to sleep, but it took a while.

Then, in the middle of the night, I woke up to the sound of our door being pushed. I tried to clear my sleepy head, and the sound came again – a deliberate push and a shake of the doorknob. It was dark in the room and I was lying in bed in my underwear and I was not ready to repel a room invasion. But the noise came again even louder, so I sat up and shouted in a big voice: “HEY!” – hoping to scare them off.

But I was really surprised when Kuniko came out of the bathroom and said, “What?”

The noise I was hearing was my poor wife trying to pull the sticky bathroom door closed, and the room invasion I had been imagining was all just in my head. We laughed to the point of tears after that – and at least on my part some of the laughs were out of relief. I’m happy to report that we survived our night in the Terminus Hotel.

Our hotel in Copenhagen also had breakfast included, and what a breakfast! We went down to the first floor and the dining room of the bar had been converted to a breakfast buffet. Hot eggs, bacon, pancakes, a plate of some of nice cheeses (cheeses I wouldn’t give out to guests – these were premium!), some yogurt that was like no other yogurt I had ever tried – maybe homemade? At each table was a tall thermos of hot coffee so we could pour our own and tamper with it how we liked. It was much better than the automatic machine from the last hotel.

Since the breakfast was so nice we lingered a bit longer. In the dining room there was a Spanish family speaking in loud volume about something that had happened last night in a restaurant somewhere. The father was full of opinions, and the rest of the family dutifully listened to him rant while they waited for their taxi. I heard a lot of Spanish on this trip.

Once we finished breakfast we got an early start on sightseeing. We first traveled south and across a river to a part of town surrounded by canals, and there we went to see the Church of Our Saviour. The spire of the cathedral was beautifully designed in dark colors with an odd spiral twist at the top – it was really attractive. We left that neighborhood and walked through more empty streets on the Nyhavn, this time having the place almost all to ourselves. I took lots of pictures of the colored buildings on the waterfront, and really spent some quality time there. From Nyhavn we headed north along the waterfront to go and try to see the mermaid statue that has become a symbol of Copenhagen. However, along the way we passed (accidentally) through a huge square. The square was about 100 yards on a side, with a big statue of Fredrik V on a horse in the center. Along the east side was the dramatic dome of the Fredrik’s Church. But other than these two landmarks, that remarkable amount of space was standing empty. Well, almost empty. At each corner of the square there was an armed guard posted. The guards were wearing formal dress, and by chance when we entered the square they started a slow march to change positions. It was a very surreal feeling to be in a space that big surrounded by four silent armed guards in a city we barely knew. As we left the square heading north a young woman was hurrying the opposite way alone, so maybe her boyfriend was working guard duty that day.

We didn’t see many other people until we reached the mermaid statue. There were already a group of Chinese tourists there posing for pictures in front of the statue. One cute old lady was lying on her side on the rocks, vaguely imitating the pose of the mermaid – it was an unusual scene. Near that area we walked through the Kastellet – an old military base that was converted into a city park. We spotted some armed soldiers walking through, so perhaps it is still active. We even found a windmill in there – interesting place.

From that area we headed generally southwest, using a long city park to make the travel more interesting. The park was really grown out and felt a little like Disney’s Jungle Cruise ride. But there weren’t many people out, it was quiet, and we felt pretty safe (no tigers!) We re-visited the Stroget shopping area, did some shopping at a supermarket called IRMA, bought a mermaid ornament to hang on our tree this Christmas, and went back to the LEGO store on the off-chance that they had restocked stormtroopers on keychains. Unfortunately they didn’t have them on the rack, so Kuniko settled for a BB-8 and Darth Vader instead. As we were paying the handsome LEGO cashier, I mentioned that we were disappointed that they didn’t have the stormtrooper keychain, and he said that he’d check the back room for us. And to our surprise (and Kuniko’s great joy) he came out with a handful of them. Kuniko bought two of them on the spot, and we left the store very happy. Kuniko started to cry – she was so happy to find it – and that was a very successful shopping trip.

After leaving the store we stumbled on another big city square with dining tables outside, so we took the opportunity to sit down in the shade of the umbrellas and become the first customer of day for a restaurant we picked at random. We bought two big Carlsberg beers and drank them outside while resting our feet from all that walking. The place was interesting – they had faux animal furs on the seats (in case we got cold) and once we sat down more customers came quickly.

Our next stop was Flying Tiger, nearby. If you remember I mentioned that in Reykjavik I had urged Kuniko to wait on buying crayfish napkins, with the rationale that Copenhagen would have them for a better price since everything was expensive in Iceland. Unfortunately Flying Tiger in Copenhagen was sold out, so we missed our chance. Oh no!

One more interesting stop was a big food hall, filled with upscale restaurants, cafes, cheesemongers, butchers and fish shops. There we bought a large fried fish cake (fiskadeller) with a side of fake crab salad and an ice cold bottle of ale. We ate on barstools in the busy market while people squeezed by behind us, and sitting together with my beautiful wife, drinking that beer and eating that food I felt like the luckiest guy in the world. It was one of those moments of bliss that seem to happen so much more often when we’re on vacation.

We made our way back to the hotel room, and unfortunately the room was not cleaned yet. We followed our standard procedure and went back down to the hotel bar to drink a little and write in this journal. I had a Tuborg beer, and Kuniko had an E-pa, and since it was an unusual item on the menu I ordered a blueberry cider. Unfortunately when it arrived I realized that it was actually apple cider with blueberry flavor. Not bad, just not what I was hoping for.

We spent a little more time resting up in our room after it was cleaned up, and outside the building in the square below someone was having a music party. He was playing dance music at a very loud volume but also singing along terribly at the top of his lungs. It went straight past annoying and on to strange and funny. We enjoyed listening to his take on euro dance, and we were laughing every few minutes when his voice cracked. Great memories of that afternoon!

In the evening we stayed a little closer to the hotel, visiting a lake built right in the city, a furniture shop that felt a little like a rip-off of IKEA, and then we moved on to our dinner restaurant, called Fridas. The reason I picked the restaurant is that it was “traditional” Danish food, and their menu had a dish I wanted to try. The interior was dark and reminded me a lot of an Irish pub, with lots of old pictures and strange utensils decorating the walls. The proprietor took our order, and we drank beers while we watched the other customers. Believe it or not, we seemed to be the only tourists in the place so that was a good sign.

Dinner came and we dug in. The dish I wanted to try was morbradboffer – a hot pot dish with fried pork in a rich red sauce, mixed together with big chunks of crispy bacon and small wieners. This is scooped onto rice and then eaten with a complete disregard for cholesterol levels. Kuniko went with veal liver with mushroom sauce, and her dish also had a side of little steamed potatoes, pickles (refreshing) and a plate of bacon. They are completely not messing around here. The beers we had here were worth mentioning, too: we had a Jacobsen Brown Ale and a Jacobsen IPA – both excellent ways to wash down all that meat.

After the big heavy meal we stopped in the store to buy some snacks for the leg of our journey, by bus and train tomorrow. We bought some chocolate, some yogurt, and some canned prosecco as a nightcap. Another big walking day with 30,080 steps – a new record for this trip.

So the alarm rings at 2:00 am and oddly enough the party is over across the street at the nightclub. We got everything packed up and rolled our suitcase out of the hotel and down the hill towards where I had made a web reservation for a pick-up at 3:00 am. I was hoping that they would remember to show up, because there are not a lot of people we could call to get a ride to the airport this early in the morning. When we arrived at the bus stop there was some relief because an older Japanese couple were there already waiting. The sun was just starting to rise and it was damn cold out there – I hoped that the Japanese couple hadn’t been waiting too long.

At 3:00 am we had our hands in our pockets trying to stay warm, and looking forward to the mini-bus but no cars appeared to help us. I saw a taxi parked down the street with the driver idling the engine, so at least we had that (expensive) option if it came down to a rush for the airport. Kuniko was just starting to lecture on the importance of professionalism in business when the mini-bus appeared at the corner and came to pick us up. Hooray! The driver was looking for one more Japanese person, who was obviously not there, and so rather than wait we took off. I wonder what happened to the missing person. Too much fermented shark?

The mini-bus took us back to the terminal, and we re-boarded a big bus, and this time they left right on time rather than waiting for the bus to fill up. It was a 45 minute drive to the airport, this time in a darker and slightly spookier situation. We listened to 80’s pop music on the radio and watched the ocean passing by on the right. At the airport things were just starting to open for the morning. We checked our bag by ourselves, and then went inside to look for some breakfast. Things were opening slowly, but when hot food became available we were right there for a ham and egg sandwich, a cheese omelet, and two mimosas.

From Iceland to Copenhagen, Denmark it takes only about 3 hours by plane. The flight itself was very smooth and we could enjoy the views down on Denmark and all the beautiful peninsulas and islands (most had farmland from coast to coast). The only hitch in the flight was an Icelandic devil child who sat behind me and was completely bonkers. He was about six years old and enjoyed screaming at random times, kicking and hitting the walls, grabbing my hair from behind, and pushing his arms through the seats to pull and hit me. His mother sat next to him trying to handle a toddler in her arms, and didn’t seem to notice. She apologized once I think, but with her accent and my skill with the Icelandic tongue it was hard to say. It was the first time in a long time I had seen anyone completely lose and give up on controlling their kid.

So we landed, changed money (from a pushy clerk) and then caught a train to Copenhagen central station, which was totally easy. The train ride was just 10 minutes or so, and then we were on the platform. We had to climb some steps (lugging the suitcase) to get out of the station but then we walked around a construction area and found our hotel just nearby, the Absalon Hotel. The hotel was a beautiful boutique style place surrounded by strip clubs and erotic wear shops. Hotel good, neighborhood exotic!

After checking in we went right back out to explore the city. It was in the early afternoon, which is the peak time for tourism, so it was a little hard to get where we wanted to go. We had to walk around Tivoli Gardens (a theme park in the middle of the city) then along busy streets taking care not to use the bicycle paths. Copenhagen and Amsterdam took their bicycle paths very clearly – they get right of way and you have to keep your head up or you’ll get clipped (or at least yelled at). As we walked around the city you could quickly see the age of the big stone buildings and really it felt like stepping into history. The lanes were a little more narrow here, and we walked through many beautiful squares and parks. We reached the popular waterfront Nyhavn, and even more people were here taking pictures and coming very close to falling into the canals on the waterfront. This place was one of the main things we wanted to see, and now that we arrived we had to share it with lots of people, cars and bike traffic. Luckily we would be able to come back later at an earlier time and avoid all this.

We also visited Rosenborg castle, built at the end of a big city park, and Kuniko made a pilgrimage to the LEGO store. LEGO started in Denmark, and so it was a special visit to see the store and look around. Kuniko was hoping to buy a Star Wars stormtrooper keychain to replace the one she has carried for many years, but unfortunately they didn’t have any – only Kylo Ren. Bummer!

Afterwards we visited the Stroget area of Copenhagen, which is filled with old stone buildings, cobblestone streets and various shops. There were a lot of tourists here, but we turned one corner and ran across one of those charming squares built around a fountain, a big oak tree, and surrounded by outdoor tables and umbrellas for people to eat, drink and relax. We instantly knew we wanted to hand out here, so we picked a restaurant with a nice menu, and sat down to an early dinner. In Denmark the traditional food we wanted to try was smorrebrod (open-faced sandwiches). Kuniko ordered one covered with little shrimp, and I had a tartar classic – raw beef, capers, an egg yolk, and onions and greens. Both sandwiches were excellent, and we had some Danish beers to wash them down.

Sitting on the square was great – I love when we can find places like this. Since I wanted to stay a little longer we extended our order with a couple glasses of wine, and enjoyed the cool weather and just watched people passing by for a while.

Eventually we decided to head back towards our hotel. On the way we passed by the train station again, and decided to try some hot dogs (also traditional Danish food) at a stand that was set up outside the station. We ordered two – one was just “rod polse” that I heard was the most traditional (but it wasn’t that exciting) and another (I forget the name) that had a bun, lots of relish and fried onions, and it knocked our socks off. Wow – so good!

We cut through the station to get back to the hotel, and passing by the exotic underwear shops we went back up to our room and called it a day. The plan: get up early tomorrow and beat all the tourists to the most popular sightseeing spots!

One of the things that I had heard about Iceland was that many people go there for the nightlife. Maybe because the sun is up for so long, or maybe it is the luxury lifestyle, but nightclubs are supposed to be big here. As it turned out, I heard correctly. We were on the second floor of our hotel, and now on then while we were sleeping I was awoken by noise from across the street. There was a nightclub nearby, and the euro beat and laughing and dancing was loud enough to disturb my sleep. It didn’t help that we went to bed so early, but despite all the noise we did manage to get enough sleep.

At this hotel we had breakfast included, so we went downstairs once it opened and had a light meal. Nothing special to report at this breakfast – they had the typical stuff like yogurt, cheese, cold cuts and coffee. They did have a sign advertising the local delicacy that we wanted to try – fermented shark – but we decided to look for it elsewhere. We got the coffee out of an automatic machine, and tried to wake ourselves up for some sightseeing.

We spent our morning walking two big circles around the town of Reykjavik. The weather was sunny, the sky was clear and blue, and the temperature was brisk but not quite cold. It was perfect weather for doing a lot of walking and we managed to see just about everything we wanted to see on foot. One of the most impressive sights was the Hallgrimskirkja cathedral, overlooking the city on the hillside. We arrived too early for it to be open but we took some nice pictures and enjoyed the solitude of being up there before the crowds. From there we walked down the hill to the waterfront, and got a chance to see the Sun Voyager, an artistic structure resembling a Viking ship on the northern coast of the city. We walked farther along the coast, breathing in fresh air and feeling totally refreshed, and came to the Harpa Amphitheater, a uniquely designed building that hosts major cultural events in town. It looked very modern against a backdrop of mountains and sea to the north. Occasionally a cruise ship or fishing boat would sail into town, and even these big ships looked tiny against a background as dramatic as the rocky shores of Iceland.

All this walking had us thirsty for a cold beer, but it was still too early for that. Instead we did another complete loop through the small town, this time stopping in at the places that were closed the first time. We went into the cathedral, and took an elevator to the top of the steeple for beautiful views of the city. The interior of the cathedral was rather plain white and they went with a simple theme, but the organ was huge and looked pretty intense. Speaking of huge organs, we skipped a visit to the Icelandic Phallological Museum, and instead went next door to check out the smallish food hall there. Unfortunately the food was mainly international dishes – nothing local that we could try out.

We stopped in at the hotel for a little break and then walked down to the harbor area to try to visit Sea Baron, a small little restaurant that serves only lobster soup and fish grilled on skewers. We had been by here the previous day but there had been a long line, so this time we arrived 15 minutes before they opened, and we were the only ones waiting. They were nice enough to open a few minutes early and let us in, and before we knew it we had two steaming bowls of lobster soup in front of us, with skewers on the way. The soup was really, really good. It was filled with big chunks of lobster and with a rich broth that made you use the bread they gave us to soak up every drop. The monster skewers of white fish were excellent as well – the fish was called “tusk”.

A little while after we arrived some Chinese tourists came in, and while they were waiting for their food they all looked at their smartphones in silence – it was a weird vibe. We finished up there, and walked to the end of the harbor to a local brewery, called Bryggian Brugghus, for a flight of all the beers that they make. They poured us six tasters of beer and we sat in comfortable chairs in the very stylish brewery bar and sampled them all. Of the six, we liked the English Ale and the Pale Ale, but they were all quite tasty. For the first time we were sitting and relaxing in a very modern atmosphere, listening to modern music instead of the 80’s pop music that had been following us around. I didn’t notice how often the 80’s music popped up until we sat there at the bar and heard the smooth hip-hop playing on their music system. It was a nice change of pace for us.

Feeling very pleasant and relaxed we walked back through town, past the Icelandic Punk Rock Museum, and started to look at restaurant menus in search of fermented shark. I had heard that it was one of those must try foods, and despite what you are about to read I’m really glad we tried it. One shop had an English menu out front, and sure enough the fermented shark was on there, so we went inside and grabbed a table. Working on the assumption that it would taste terrible, we also ordered a small bowl of mussels in cream sauce, and two Icelandic beers. The restaurant was a little on the upscale side, but they didn’t mind that we were taking a food challenge there.

Our beers and food arrived, and the first sign of trouble was that the fermented shark arrived in a sealed glass jar. I can’t recall ever being served food in a restaurant that was in a container you had to open. We prepared our stomachs, wrinkled our noses, and twisted off the lid. No big cloud of horrible smell came out, and my confidence briefly rose, but once you stuck your nose in there you got a slight whiff of something – ammonia? Sour fish? The chunks of shark were cut into cubes so it was easy to take a bite-sized piece. I popped a piece or two in my mouth, and at first you kind of brace for something terrible, but up front there isn’t a bad taste. And then suddenly, an intense ammonia flavor comes in, and spreads throughout your mouth, up your nostrils and down your throat. I chugged some beer to clear it but it takes some time – and that was just one little chunk. Kuniko also tasted it, and after a few more morbid bites we closed the container and sent the remaining five or six pieces back. Luckily the mussels were much better, and that was the flavor that was lingering on our tongues as we left the restaurant.

On our way back to the hotel we stopped in to look at the local branch of Flying Tiger – a store that began in Copenhagen that is similar to a 100 yen store but with slightly more stylish things. Their store in Reykjavik had some interesting stuff, and Kuniko almost bought some cocktail napkins decorated with crayfish, but I urged her not to buy them here as Iceland is so expensive, and our next city would be Copenhagen itself – it’d be much cheaper and easy to find. It turns out I was wrong.

For dinner that night we walked down the hillside like locals and went to a restaurant called “Messinn” which specialized in skillets of seafood. You choose the kind of fish, and then they cook it for you in a skillet with a various sauces and then add veggies along with it and serve the whole hot skillet to you at your table. We drank more Icelandic beers and Kuniko had a skillet of Atlantic char with a honey nut sauce, potatoes and greens, and I had wolf-fish with a nutty cream sauce and veggies. While we were there a foodie tour came through – a big group of people who didn’t really know each other and sat in a circle in the back of the restaurant – it was kind of cult-y vibe. They all did self-introductions while sampling some dishes, and then a while later they all left for the next restaurant. For dessert we had a chocolate cake with an excellent molten-like texture with vanilla ice cream, and I had an espresso to balance it all out. Yum!

Since we were planning on a very, very early wake up the next day we went and did a little shopping for snacks for the trip, and then went back to the hotel. I knew that we had to wake up at 2:00 am the next day, so I found myself in bed, with the sun shining through the curtains right into my eyes, trying to sleep. Finally, after what seemed like forever, I fell asleep, but was jolted back awake now and then by the nightclub next door – screaming, singing, broken glass. It was a rough night sleep-wise.

We went out for our usual coffee and breakfast, back again to the busy café that was much less busy this morning. We had a tuna melt with our coffees, then went back to the hotel to make the most of our room until we had to check out. Having a clean toilet and free Wi-Fi is a luxury you shouldn’t pass up while traveling.

We checked out of the hotel, and caught a bus to the airport almost immediately, right across the street from our hotel. We used bus route 747 to get to the airport, and this time we sat on the upper deck and enjoyed the views as we traveled. Around us the chatter of people was surprisingly loud – everyone was excited about traveling somewhere from the airport. It is interesting to see the contrast with Japan, where the bus is always silent going or coming from the airport.

I ordered one last Guinness at the airport while we waited for our flight at an airport bar. Next to us was an interesting group of nerdy people meeting for the first time judging from all the awkward pauses in their conversation. It was an international bunch of people, speaking English all with different accents, and I wondered if there was a technology or gaming convention somewhere nearby. Eventually we figured we had killed enough time at the bar and we went upstairs to the departure check-in lines.

Unfortunately there were no staff checking in passengers at our gate, and after waiting about a half hour one staff showed up and started working. Still, the whole plane was waiting in line, and at the rate she was working that one staff member wouldn’t be able to get us all checked in. About an hour later more staff showed up, but it was a very long wait in line and we were both glad we had a chance to get a drink before we started waiting. Security was also not so organized, and so my last impression of Dublin International Airport was not a positive one.

While waiting to board Kuniko and I worked on some snacks that we had accumulated during our travels so far – shamrock and sour cream flavored potato chips (not so shamrocky) and a package of choco-pies that were high in calories but low in satisfaction. Finally we could board our Iceland Air flight to Reykjavik and we got two seats right across from the boarding door. A guy in front of us went up into business class and then came back, telling the flight attendant that he bought a business class ticket but having no proof he had to sit with the rest of the schmucks in economy.

Iceland Air was a pretty stingy airline. Despite being a full-fledged airline (not a low-cost carrier) they were selling earphones to passengers (rather than giving them out like other airlines) and charging for drinks and snacks. It was only a couple of hours in the air so no problem, but still, pretty lame. One strange moment came when the door was closed and then suddenly someone from outside started knocking on the plane door, so they had to re-open it. Apparently someone was missing from the roster, but they confirmed they were onboard, and then the closed the door again.

Another odd thing was the flight attendant’s fold down seat was positioned right next to mine, and since she was facing the back of the plane it was an awkward sort of situation were eye contact was unavoidable. I thought I should ask a question to break the, uh, ice, so I asked about the bus tickets available for sale on the plane. I had bought some online but I was wondering how much they were on the plane to see if I got a good deal. The flight attendant didn’t know the price, but promised to find out for me. Later she gave me the information and sighed loudly and actually rolled her eyes when I said I didn’t want to buy the tickets at this time. Like I said – awkward! But it was kind of cool to sit up near the front of the plane and see all this drama that we usually miss in the back.

It was just a two hour flight from Dublin to Reykjavik, Iceland, and the line at immigration was quite short. Our suitcase was already on the carousel when we got there, and we went outside and got right on our bus that I had online tickets for. It is a long way from the airport to the center of town – about 45 minutes – so the bus was essential. It was still expensive, about $30/person each way. Despite the high price, the bus wouldn’t leave until it was completely full. Our full size bus had five open seats, so we had to sit and wait about 20 more minutes until another flight came in, and then we got our five people and we could go.

The drive from the airport to the city center was like a bus trip across the moon. The landscape quickly became desolate and empty, and the odd shaped rocks and lack of plants really contributed to a kind of “other world” feeling. As we traveled northeast from the airport the ocean was on our left, a calm sea of dark, deep blue. On the right were ridges and rocks cracked and pushed together and emptiness as far as we could see. It would be a fun place to go camping if you wanted to get away from it all.

Eventually we came closer and closer to civilization, and then into the city of Reykjavik. Buildings were made of different stuff here – less stone and more wood, with some shops but a big difference from the strip malls of suburban America. The bus dropped us off at the central bus terminal, and from there we were separated into smaller groups and taken by mini-bus to a bus stop close to our hotels. Apparently the city banned buses inside the city center, so the mini-buses drove around the outside and left us as close as possible to our hotel. It was actually pretty close, though – we walked just a block or two before we could check in to our hotel, the Hotel Fron.

Our room in the hotel was big, and nicely designed in a Scandinavian style. To reach our room we actually had to open a side door in the hotel and walk across a balcony to another building, which was kind of odd. Still the room was comfortable and we were excited to be in Iceland. We were also pretty hungry!

So back out into town and on the prowl for something to eat. Our first impression of town was a quaint city square, kind of like the touristy part of Sonoma, but all traffic on foot. The streets were lined with shops, some classy, some touristy, and it was clean and felt safe and comfortable. I had a couple of restaurants on my map that we could try for dinner, but as we walked across town we eliminated them one by one, for various reasons. This place looked too touristy, that place looked too fancy, another place had a big line of people. As we got hungrier and as we walked more we got a little more impatient to eat, and finally we settled on The Lobster House – an historic restaurant perched on the hillside near the downtown area. It was a beautiful building, and we checked the menu and it seemed like the food would be good. We stepped inside and could tell right away this place was upscale, and we probably weren’t dressed for it.

An alien-like female staff member came up and asked if we had reservations and we said that we didn’t as we looked around at many empty tables. She left to check with someone to see if she could seat us, and Kuniko was starting to have second thoughts about the place. After a long time the alien lady came back and said she could put us at a table, and we sat down in a small dining room situated in between the main dining room and a back room filled with a large family group that was speaking a combination of Spanish and English. Our server gave us some bread right away (I guess we looked hungry) and combined with a glass or two of red wine the “hangry” feeling went away and we started to enjoy the experience.

For dinner we started with a plate of Icelandic delicacies (their term): horse meat carpaccio, cucumber jelly, Atlantic char, and thinly sliced whale raw whale meat with beet and seaweed. Maybe a challenge for some people but coming from Japan it was all food we’ve had before and they did a great job with the ingredients. Kuniko’s main dish was excellent – a cod fillet served on lentils with a tomato and carrot lasagna, Mine was a homerun – bacon-wrapped mutton stuffed with dates on a hazelnut sauce, mushroom ravioli, candied carrots, and three lobster tails on the side. It was one of the best dishes of the entire trip – we were eating well! We were afraid that the price would be really expensive, and since all the prices were in ISK instead of dollars, yen or euros, it was kind of hard to guess, but in the end it wasn’t all that expensive compared with eating at a nice restaurant in Japan. Our server was much friendlier than the alien-like being who had seated us, and she kept up conversation and gave us a free round of drinks to be nice. I left a cash tip after Kuniko paid by credit card, and learned later that tipping isn’t a custom in Iceland. Oh well! It was a mind-blowing meal, and we left in a state of food-euphoria.

After dinner we walked around a bit as the sun was still out (and it stayed out for most of the night), and we bought some Icelandic yogurt (called skyr) and some water at a local convenience store, and there went back to the room to get some rest. Changing countries is always exciting and today was a good day.

Once again we got up on the early side, this time to arrive in time for an appointment for entry to the Trinity University’s Library. Long ago I had seen a photo of the “long room” in the old university library, and it looked beautiful. I was hoping to see it for myself. We ate a quick breakfast of coffee and a blueberry muffin served to us by a couple of chatty middle-aged ladies working at a café. It was surprising to see all the commuters walking to work today. Yesterday was a public holiday and so the streets had seemed empty, but today we were walking around during the morning rush. I noticed that there was a very heterogeneous mix of races in Dublin, even more so than what I remember from big cities in the USA.

The university campus is active and open to visitors, so we spent a little time walking around and seeing the sights. It felt a little like going back to school, except that no actual university students would be up this early. There was already a tour group waiting in line outside the library when we arrived, and the tour conductor was telling story after story to his captive audience. His tour group seemed hesitant to ask questions, and I could tell the tour conductor was starting to sweat as he ran out things to talk about. Right after we lined up behind that tour group another tour group lined up behind us, so we were sandwiched between tourists. Once the doors opened up, the advantage was ours as the tour guides wanted to show all the preliminary exhibits to build up to the old library, but we could head there straightaway. The “Long Room” of the University Library was impressive, indeed. We had the room to ourselves for just a little while, and I tried to make the most of the silence. The bookshelves stretched a long distance, decorated by marble busts of famous university graduates. In the center of the room some particular documents were showcased in glass. We also got to see Brian Boru’s Harp, an historical harp that apparently wasn’t actually Brian Boru’s, however the legend kind of followed the harp until it was generally considered true.

We left via the gift shop, and had some good laughs looking at the photos of the fashion models wearing each piece of Trinity U. apparel. One particular model was featured prominently, wearing an afro and a smile (both huge) in each picture – we loved that he looked nothing like a fashion model and was clearly enjoying his job.

For one more traditional Irish dish we had to go get a full Irish breakfast at Gallagher’s Boxty, a breakfast café located at the heart of the cobblestone streets of the Temple Bar area. I ordered a pint of beer to make the breakfast even more hearty. The full Irish breakfast was similar to the full English breakfast we had eaten during previous trips. There was bacon, eggs, sausage, white and black pudding, a roasted tomato, and (the reason that we had come here) boxty – a kind of potato pancake. Kuniko had a lighter meal of avocado toast, but we were damn full by the end of our brunch. While we ate I had a nice view of a pub across the way, and a guy sleeping under some cardboard boxes in the alley next door. The pub owner came into work, saw the sleeping guy, and a few minutes later a policewoman appeared and rousted the (hungover? homeless?) guy onto his feet and had him moving down the way. We did see quite a few beggars/homeless around Dublin during our short stay.

The rest of the afternoon we did a little shopping around town. Kuniko bought some warmer clothes for Iceland at H&M, and we also bought some cheese at Sheridan’s cheese shop which had been closed the previous day. The cheese shop was located in a fairly nice part of town – lots of expensive shops and hotels around. The cheese wasn’t that expensive at all – I bought some Irish creamy blue cheese and it was only 2 euros for 100 grams. I would have to pay ten times that in Japan for high quality cheese. While we were out we also walked through a nice park, Saint Stephen’s Green, to get a little nature into our day. The weather was threatening a bit so we went back to our hotel but again found our room uncleaned as of yet. Once again we went down to the bar to spend a little time. I drank an apple cider (since I don’t get many chances to drink cider in Japan) from a company called Orchard Thieves, and Kuniko had another Roe & Red. By the time we wrapped up at the bar our room was cleaned so we had a little cheese picnic in the room and then took a nap. Peaceful days like this are why we call it a vacation!

In the evening we decided to walk around and look for a place for dinner. To start, we walked in a completely new direction, and I kept my map in my pocket. In this new area, north of the Dublin Spire, we found lots of churches, and many grungy-looking apartments. All over Dublin we found graffiti, especially some we liked featuring a little masked-man luchador. Just like any big city there are some bad parts of town, and we had found one that day. It didn’t feel dangerous, just a little run down.

And then suddenly, a big crowded area of brand shops and shopping malls opened up in front of us. It wasn’t the usual kind of place we like to hang out in our travels, but it was fun to look at what a shopping mall is like in a different country. The mall was pretty crowded, so I guess economically things are going well. In the supermarkets we found abnormally large areas selling freshly baked cakes and sweets, and I noticed that pork was especially cheap in Dublin. The cheese selection at the average shop was much bigger than we’d see in Japan, so another reason to be jealous. As we left the shopping area a surprisingly talented older man was doing a street performance of old show tunes while dancing around. He had a good-sized crowd admiring his performance as we passed by.

For dinner we decided on a place called The Winding Stair. It is located above a bookshop (owned by the same people) and looks out over the River Liffey and Ha’penny Bridge. We arrived too late for lunch and too early for dinner, but the guy said he didn’t mind giving us a table as long as we ordered a couple of dishes to go with our wine. The atmosphere of the place was light and airy, full of distressed old dark wood, with an extensive bar in the corner. We were the only customers at that time – some people tried to come in for just drinks but our staff turned them away because they needed serve food (legally, I guess). We ordered some wine by the glass, and then three appetizers (that were the size of main dishes in Japan). The first was local crab with butter made into a spread and served with Irish soda bread and a green salad. The second appetizer was a creamy seafood chowder, with generous chunks of salmon, scallop, bacon, and some mussels floating around inside. And the third dish was duck leg meat pressed cold into blocks with cherries, pistachios, capers and pickles. All three dishes were excellent, and thanks to the size and variety of dishes it was the best meal of the trip so far.

Eventually we finished up our meal and headed back to the hotel, only stopping once at a small (low budget?) market called “Iceland” to buy some rhubarb yogurt and snacks. There was a security guard standing in the front watching everyone going in and out, and helping the cashiers now and then when they needed something. Once again we had lots of steps – this time 20,229.

I think I first wanted to visit Ireland back in the mid-nineties while drinking Guinness with Brian Haven in Murphy’s pub back in Sonoma. Two of the servers were Irish and had great accents, and we used to throw darts and drink round after round of Guinness, and I thought that someday I’d like to see where this kind of pub culture came from. It took a while, but here I was in Dublin 25 years later.

Kuniko and I finally got out of bed and started our first full day in Dublin by venturing out in search of coffee. A couple of blocks away from our hotel we found a place that was open, so we walked inside to find a chaotic scene. Apparently there was a big rush on coffee, and one of the two baristas working was in training, and so there was a lot of stress in the café. We waited quite a while, and we finally ended up with one latte instead of two, and a pastrami cheese roll that was pretty good. The trainer barista acknowledged the mistake and gave us another cup of java, and we finished up as the line for service grew longer and longer. Kuniko cleaned up our table after we bused the dishes back to the counter – apparently that isn’t a thing in Ireland because some people gave us a funny look as we left.

One thing we learned quickly in Dublin is that pedestrians cross the street when they think they have a chance. There are crossing signals for pedestrians but they are hopelessly long and so everyone just runs across when they see an opening. It was a little startling at first but soon we got used to it. The city has thoughtfully provided writing on the street for the pedestrians that says “Look left” or “Look right” depending on the traffic flow. I do think that some people distracted by the phones probably get hit more often than in other cities – it looks dangerous. In the end we got used to things and started dashing out into the streets along with the locals.

Our first appointment of the day was a tour of the Guinness Storehouse. I had made some reservations in advance, and so we walked across town to go check out the tour. On the way we stopped in at St. Patrick’s Cathedral. The cathedral was as beautiful inside as it was outside, and they had made the interior tourist friendly with plenty of educational materials to explain exactly why each religious icon or design was special. It is one thing to see a stained glass window, but they had explanations to the side that clearly showed the significance of some of the details, and it helped to appreciate things more. The gift shop was really big – bigger than most I’ve seen in churches in Europe. They had some extremely cheesy goods, and I thought at the time that it was an oddly blatant crossing between consumerism and religion.

The Guinness Storehouse is not the brewery (which is at a separate facility down the street) but instead a huge complex built to showcase the beer, educate the visitors, and sell lots of Guinness goods. The design of the facility and the quality of the tour is top-notch. The way it is designed is that you start on the ground floor, and slowly work your way up via a series of escalators, learning more and more as you go. There are several tastings along the way that we enjoyed, with some good-natured fun poked at Americans by the staff. The final stage is a pint of fresh Guinness at the top floor which is a circular bar room enclosed in glass offering a dramatic view of the skyline of Dublin. The place was busy but not packed when we reached it, and it nice to have a beer and enjoy the view. There was a big group of Chinese tourists visiting at that time, and they moved as a pack and were making friends with some of the white (European?) tourists. Many pictures were taken all around, and when we left the place was just starting to fill up. On the way out we stopped in the gift shop for a couple of souvenirs – we were good customers.

From the Storehouse we headed east back toward the center of town. On the way I had hoped to stop at a highly recommended fish and chips place, but it was closed for the summer holidays. We instead stopped at another pub, the Boar’s Head Inn. If you want traditional food, pubs are the way to go in Ireland, and there’s one on almost every corner – open all day long. We had a some good fish and chips there, and also a bowl of Irish stew that hit the spot. Everything was heavy – much heavier food than we usually eat, and this was only the beginning of a long trip. While we were out we went to check out Dublin Castle, but what remained of the building wasn’t too exciting, so it was a short visit. When we returned to our hotel our room wasn’t cleaned yet, so we visited the hotel bar which was surprisingly nice, and sat at one of the back tables to drink, write in this journal, and relax. I had a Rockshore Lager that was simple but delicious, and Kuniko had a cocktail called Roe & Red. It was based on Irish whiskey and it was tasty, even with a big cinnamon stick stuck in the glass.

Eventually we went back out on the town, first to check out a cheese shop (closed because it was a “bank holiday”), and then we found our way to Klaw, our choice of restaurant for the evening. Klaw is a seafood place, and I had heard that they had plenty of lobster on the menu. We arrived a bit early for dinner, and they were only serving drinks and oysters. We ordered some prosecco and reviewed the menu, but the service was quite slow. One of the things about visiting Europe is that it takes a little time to shift our expectations on service speed – things are much more prompt in Japan. I don’t mind the slower service, but it does take a little getting used to.

We ordered up some food, starting with some oysters. Due to a miscommunication during the ordering process we received a couple raw oysters and a couple that were “blowtorched” at our table. The torched oysters had some spinach, cheese, butter, and garlic melted together over them, and then we ate them cooked. The raw ones were also good – from the Galway coast. We also had an order of crab on toast that was great. Unfortunately the lobster roll was mainly roll, and not much lobster. That was the only culinary disappointment of the day. After dinner we walked through the Temple Bar area, kind of a historic pub/tourist area, passed a strange building on the backstreets with a sign saying, “Turkish Social Club”, and then eventually wandered back to our hotel to head to bed. We finished the day with about 27,000 steps!

Because we were so excited about our summer trip we woke up a bit earlier than usual, at 4:15 am, and started prepping the house for the two weeks that it would sit empty in the summer heat. We’ve got a comprehensive checklist worked out by now, so we knocked out the tasks quickly. We rolled out with our suitcase into the humidity and headed to the train station, already sweating even before sunrise. Taking the first train out of Okubo, when we arrived at the bus line in Sannomiya it was surprisingly crowded. We elected to take the second bus, avoiding having to sit in the extra capacity center seats that are both uncomfortable and solitary.

The result of our early start was that we arrived more than three hours before our departure. Usually the departure check-in lanes are posted on the board about three hours before the flight, but for some reason there was a delay in posting our flight on Singapore Airlines. For a short time there was a little tinge of fear that we had arrived at the airport on the wrong day – or that I had misread an email or something. But in the end we found our way to the check in line, and thanks to our online check in we could skip much of the waiting.

Our first leg was a 6 1/2 hour flight to Singapore – piece of cake. We slept a bit on the flight, and the video system was a newer model and filled with interesting movies and music to keep us occupied. Upon arrival at Singapore’s Changi Airport we had a fair amount of time (7 hours!) to kill before the next leg of the journey, so we set about exploring. The airport had recently completed a new expansion, called “Jewel”, but unfortunately it was located outside security, so we’d have to officially enter the country, and then leave the country and go through security all over again if we wanted to visit. We figured we’d save Jewel for the return trip. Instead we focused on a search for the salted egg steamed buns that I am so addicted to. Just after entering the transfer area we saw a restaurant with a big electronic sign that flashed a sexy picture of a salted egg bun breaking open, and so we went right over and sat down at the table. Upon consultation with our server, we discovered that they no longer serve the salted egg buns and we’d have to find something else on the menu. Rather than waste a chance, we left the table and moved on.

We are picky about food, so it took a while to survey the food choices of nearly the entire airport. We stopped for a cold beer at a “sports bar” located in one of the terminals, and had an IPA made by a craft brewery in Singapore. It was easy drinking (although expensive) and it gave us the energy to keep up the food search. While we were drinking our beers at the bar a customer came in and after reviewing her options on the draft beers she ordered the same thing we were drinking, although she said, “I’ll have an E-pa”. It took me a second to realize that she was pronouncing the “I” as an “E”, but the server didn’t even flinch and served it up to her right away. It would be hard for me to resist the education opportunity here but the server was a real professional. Kuniko and I were joking about “E-pas” during the rest of the trip.

Finally we discovered a restaurant that served mini-sized salted egg buns, and so we ate those with some Hong Kong-style noodles. We washed them down with another beer at a brew-pub. Kuniko had a Singapore Sling, mixed up by a cool lesbian bartender/DJ who was very friendly and intently focused on choosing the next song to play in the bar.

Back on an airplane, and this time for a long haul. The flight from Singapore to Amsterdam was 13 hours or so, and I was eager to get some shut-eye. We had a cabin attendant that was really pro-active about customer service, and we heard her say to another passenger that it was her first flight. True or not, she made sure to wake me up every time she walked past with a hot towel, food, drink, extra blankets, whatever. Let me sleep!

Because it was a long flight I couldn’t sleep through all of it, but thanks to the great video system we kept ourselves entertained. I was in a middle seat between Kuniko at the window and a fairly aggressive old guy who was made extra effort to dominate the armrest between us. He also had the “old guy smell” which wasn’t pleasant but I hated to think what I smelled like after the distance that we’d come from Japan.

Finally, we arrived at Amsterdam airport. But even after all that travel, we still had one more flight to catch. We waited for about four hours in the airport to catch our KLM flight to Dublin. Since our next flight was on a different airline we had to claim our suitcase, and then bring it back in through security. The KLM area at Amsterdam airport had an interesting self-check baggage system, where you had to wait in line to use an automatic machine. The machine apparently broke down quite a bit – about half the windows were shut down with notices saying it was out of order, so it took a long time to get rid of our bag again. But these kinds of situations are exactly why we left a four hour window for this stopover – tight connections mean more stress and risk. We had a premium tuna sandwich and some red wine, did some shopping for souvenirs (they had lots of cheese available at the airport shops – that was a good sign), and then caught our flight to Dublin.

After a 13 hour flight a 2 hour flight feels like a blink of the eye. I watched from the window as we flew over English and came in on approach in Dublin, Ireland – our final stop for the day. The immigration line was very short, but there were surprisingly many questions: “Where did you come from?” “Where are you going from here?” “How many days in each country?” “Why are you traveling to Ireland?” Usually there are hardly any questions at all so it was kind of refreshing to experience.

We picked up our suitcase and went outside to catch a big double decker bus into town. Just as we got on the bus it started to sprinkle, but the rain stopped soon after, and by the time we got off near the Busaras Station 30 minutes later, there was a clear sky above us. We checked into the Beresford Hotel right across from the bus station, and went up to our room. What followed was one of the best showers I’ve ever taken. Hard to believe that we had been traveling for more than 24 hours!

Off we went to see about dinner. It was late afternoon when we arrived in Dublin, so we went to Madigan’s Pub, a place I found recommended on the web which wasn’t far from the hotel. We ordered a couple of Guinness beers, and I had a bacon and cabbage plate, which was a very heavy but delicious meal. Kuniko went with the somewhat lighter salmon sampler plate. It felt good to be relaxing in a pub – the interior was very traditional with wood paneling, a copper gilded bar, and (strangely) 80’s American pop music on the music system. People came and went outside to smoke, and the group in the back of the pub was lively. We sat in a booth up front, drinking our beers and feeling exhausted.

After our meal we decided to walk around a tiny bit and get a feel for the sightseeing that we might do later on. We did get in a little walk, but quickly our energy levels faded so we went back to the hotel and went to bed around 4:30 pm. It was great to lie down in a fully horizontal position. We didn’t stir for about 13 hours – it was one hell of a travel day.