In journalism or travel writing, many travel pieces are intended to be “service” pieces—to serve the reader by giving recommendations, telling them what to do, etc. You can plan for these types of stories and actively take note of your activities, restaurants, itineraries as you’re traveling. Then there are “personal essay” type pieces intended to evoke emotions, resonance, or a sense of connectedness through the telling of an experience or story. You definitely can’t plan for these, like when my camera was stolen in Ecuador or we had to go to Hawaii instead of Greece.
I’m afraid my Amsterdam experience has very little of either of these things for you, the reader.
I participated in a five-day International Circling festival in Havelete, a town in the Dut
ch countryside that I can’t imagine anyone visiting outside of this retreat center. I spent a lot of time sleeping and nature walking, which was less exciting than Norway but I got to walk a bit barefoot so that was fun (always barefoot in Europe!).
this is the canal we jumped in
I then spent the next couple of days in Amsterdam and while I am obsessed with my airbnb* there—click here to stay in the same one, in a great location near Vondelpark—I didn’t do much besides chill with my brother, rock climb, bike around, bike around in the pouring rain, rent a bike to bike around, jump in a canal (highly recommend!), wander vondelpark, have a random brunch above the city, meet a b-school friend for dinner (note that in much of Europe they DON’T use yelp and DO use TripAdvisor for restaurant reviews), visit a secret bar and bunker (two separate locales fwiw), and take a ten-minute stroll through the red light district.
how are the dutch so great at the riding-on-the-back-of-the-bike thing?!
If I must leave you with some insight—and I must, because that’s what writers do–it is that travel doesn’t have to BE anything. You don’t have to check a damn thing off of a list. Did you enjoy yourself? Have a good time? Get out of your normal routine? Boom, you did it. You traveled.
spent more time chilling with these people than seeing the sights in amsterdam. an excellent choice.
OK, fine, also, here are five of my favorite Amsterdam places
Coffee & Coconuts – amazing food, fabulous atmosphere, we spent too much time here
D&A – a delicious dinner in Jordaan
Door 74 – not that secret secret bar, a little hokey, but fun nonetheless
Het Lab – no I don’t have any idea what it means, but it was a cool bouldering gym
Floor 17 at the Ramada – brunch was mediocre, views were amazing. My Dutch friends said this is typical of Dutch restaurants–it’s about atmosphere not food. If you want awesome food, you get some other type of cuisine, like D&A!
—
*about my airbnb (this one): the design! the colors! the nespresso available without getting out of bed! the private bathroom! I loved many things about it, but none so much as the softest, most snuggly duvet cover I’ve ever felt in my whole entire life. I creeped on it and found the tag and was shocked to see it’s from IKEA—but European IKEA, so I couldn’t order it online and had to buy it on ebay and get it shipped and it’s cleared customs but hasn’t arrived yet and I can’t wait to see if the duvet is that great or it’s just been washed a kabillion times because airbnb. If you believe me and don’t want to wait to see how mine turns out, this fabulous IKEA Gulltorel duvet is on ebay here (see? service journalism). The color of the one in the airbnb is definitely more “duck egg” or teal than the cornflower blue pictured, but since I haven’t gotten mine yet idk.