Amsterdam, Netherlands
Our big adventure is underway with great success. This morning we arrived in Amsterdam after a long two flights from home. We almost missed our connection in Philadelphia because we were delayed by weather. It’s a good thing we’ve both been working out because we pulled an OJ and sprinted through the PHL airport in order to get on our flight to Amsterdam with just about 5 minutes to spare.
There is a nine hour time difference between home and Amsterdam, so we arrived at 8:30 a.m. and are just beginning to feel the jet lag. As such, the one-hour city canal boat tour sounded like the best way to ease into this fascinating place.

Bridges across the canals in Amsterdam
As we expected, Europe is gaga over the World Cup. Here in the Netherlands, the team/national color is orange. Everywhere we look there are orange banners, flags, balloons, and other celebratory symbols. The home team plays again tomorrow so we are expecting to join the party. Stay tuned.
So far we have seen hundreds of bikes here in the city, but none like we’ll see next week at the Tour de France. In Amsterdam, the bike is more common than the car.

Steve is in heaven
Tomorrow we plan to partake. Tonight though, we plan to just wander around and maybe explore the famed red light district. But only to look!
We have access to the hotel’s Club Lounge thanks to Marnie’s gold-level status with Marriott. That means we get complimentary breakfast and happy hour. So, we are on our first Heinekens now, straight from the tap! Life is good!
Please stay tuned for more. We’ll try to post something each day along the way.