DAY 26: We depart for Amsterdam today! Would've loved to stay in Berlin for an extra few days though... It emits such a youthful and hip vibe with fantastic shopping, eateries and such a varied history and culture. I'm glad me and Andie will be returning here again in August. 7:30am departures are always tough and we spend another full day driving today, which I've surprisingly gotten used to and actually not mind sitting in the same position all day.

We stop off at a traditional Holland farmhouse just before we get to the hostel selling handmade (decorated) wooden clogs and farm cheeses. The natural cheese was amazing and the Dutch dude there was quite quirky, speaking to myself and Andie in weird chinese that we both didn't understand.

When we got to the Hans Brinker hostel at 6:30 and checked into our room. Anjuli, James and Andie were quite horrified at the state of the rooms we were to stay in for the next 2 nights. A comment was even made that prisons in Sweden were probably better than this hostel. There was also a poster by the entrance proudly stating that a bit of germs and bacteria will help boost the immune system. Andie was close to getting a panic attack at the thought of having to stay here for the next 2 nights! I didn't see it as being that awful...sure the toilet cover was missing, there was some hair in the shower and there was no ledge to prevent water from travelling to the wash basin area... And the room was vinyl concrete floor that looked like it hadn't been mopped...but I wasn't feeling out too much. A bit of a bad finish to the trip as all other accommodation has been pretty comfortable!

We congregated at 7:30pm for the start of our Amsterdam walking tour...Amsterdam had numerous canals, bridges, bicycles, and very filthy streets too (littered with ciggy butts), but in general alot of tall people (they are the tallest race in the world). Went past many "coffee shops" (where you can smoke marijuana as opposed to 'coffee houses' or 'cafes') and the stench was STRONG!

Had some horrible dry ribs from an Argentinian grill place near the monument in Dam Square, then walked through the Red Light District towards "Moulin Rouge" for our live sex show at 9:30. OMG. what surprised me the most was when we turned onto an alleyway and BANG! The entire street hits you with glass doors and windows all with skimpily clad prostitutes luring potential customers walking past.Sone were quite pretty too. It was pretty surreal!
I had no idea it was like this!! I felt so ignorant cos it seemed like I was the only person who didn't know about it.

Waiting in line to get into the sex show was a little manic, as everyone wanted a seat not in the front row. We managed to sit behind the bar. There were 4 different short acts, all up lasting 1 hour...it included (on top of compete nudity of course):
1) Rhys getting his balls whacked and pulling a ribbon out of a p**** slowly
2) Wes getting grinded and whipped and having "nasty boy" written by a marker positioned in a vagina
3) Michelle, Selina, Eddy and Aiden all dancing with the woman and eating a piece if banana from her chest or nether regions...
And the worst part was seeing a couple having live sex. It was robotic... And frankly looked like 2 dogs just humping each other, changing positions every few thrusts.. Looked so awkward and not enjoyable at all.
The other acts were funny and interesting to watch though.

Me, Andie and James then wandered through the red light district afterwards, seeing countless groups of bachelor parties and drunken and stoned groups of young people, loads of "coffee shops" and sex shops and of course the red lights of the rooms with the glass windows and doors.

We headed back to our hostel just after midnight, Andie was a tad stoned after eating a piece of hash brownie. Haha...i have yet to try it for myself tomorrow :)