Up early today as we have planned a little side trip on the train. Mom makes our breakfast in the kitchen. Nothing fancy. Corn flakes, toast, yogurt, fruit and coffee. We spent €10 at the grocery store and we will get 3 breakfasts out of that, quite the discount. We like to eat at the table by the window and people watch while drinking our coffee. I work on the blog a bit while she gets ready and then off we go. At Centraal station, we take a I hour t...

Unbelievable. It's 9:30am. I just woke earlier and it was 6. What happened? We slept for 15 hours. I know we were tired from the flight but that's crazy. We have plans. That's ok. Mom? We got to hurry up. We're going to the Christmas park, the canal ride, the night canal ride and shopping. We're getting a late start but we'll be ok if we roll.First there's breakfast to make, then makeup time plus whatever. We don't leave the h...

The Amsterdam airport is spread out, like a big U. Mom and I had to walk from the gate at one end of the U to our baggage claim at the other. It's far and took us some time. Immigration, customs and baggage went quickly. I activated our Eurail pass right at the airport and we took the train right from the airport into downtown Amsterdam, a 17 minute ride.At Centraal station, it was about a ten minute walk to our apartment in the De Wallen district (old to...

Today is a travel day. All day. Right now we're sitting at gate 44 waiting to leave for Minneapolis at 12:35pm, about an hour from now. Last night at thanksgiving we were telling everyone about using our Clipper cards tomorrow for our BART ride to SFO. That's when Milan offered to take us for bridge toll only. Mmmmm? Ok. It sounds easy. At home, Mom was still trying to get more stuff into her 50# bags without adding any weight. Huh? They were supp...

What a difference a room makes! I awake somewhat earlier than anticipated to the ocean waves washing up on the beach below. I lay here for a while contemplating the busy day ahead until the alarm goes off at 8, the official getup time. I'm pretty much always packed, with everything ini my bag except what I'm wearing. At the nice hotel in Tlaquepaque where I stayed for 7 nights, I did unpack the hang up stuff, otherwise I just live out of it. So this m...