Ok.  I think I have a new favorite European city!!

Amsterdam is in.cred.i.ble.  From the beautiful buildings that line the canals (#houseGOALS) to the insane number of trendy, interesting, and cool cafes, bars, restaurants, and shops, to the coffeeshops, art museums, and abundance of activities…this extremely bike friendly city left me so impressed and a plan to go back one day.

During the four days we spent there, we kept talking about how Amsterdam just expands and expands and seems to go on forever. Most cities have a “city center” where you find the nicest buildings, best restaurants, and coziest cafes.  But in Amsterdam, winding throughout the canals and beyond, you can find amazing things to do, eat, and look at.  Even in the more “residential” parts (a.k.a without the canals and tourists)

We were there for four days (Tuesday, December 27- Saturday, December 31 2016), which was the perfect amount of time to do the things we wanted to do, but also relax and enjoy our time (in the FREEZING cold).

Do we look cold????

Our flight from Madrid was crazy early, taking off at 7:20 am, so you can imagine how fun that wake-up was.  We had breakfast, got the rest of our things together and then headed to the airport.  I slept the entire flight…like drooling, insane-dreams, confused-where-I-am-when-I-wake-up sleep.  The best kind of plane sleep 😉  Once we arrived, we headed to our AirBnb which was super easy to get to!!  Accommodation in Amsterdam is CRAZY EXPENSIVE, even though the city itself is not very expensive.  For that reason, we booked a room in a house instead of booking an entire flat, which is more comfortable.  Luckily, the hosts were great, really friendly, and didn’t hover.  I hate helicopter hosts haha.  Since we had an early flight, we had most of the day to be out and about.  It was the warmest day (by far) so we took advantage and did lots of walking to get a feel for the city.  (Actually, that’s a lie because we walked so much every day but maybe we walked the most this day…?)

But first!  Some fuel to get us through until we found our next sandwiches (seriously, most of what we ate for 4 days were various sandwiches (bocadillos).  The first one was courtesy of Luis’ sweet mom whom always packs huuuuge bocadillos stuffed with tortilla espanola.

Pure happiness.

We found an outdoor food market!  It was quite small though.

Love, love, love the architecture.

These are oliebollen, which are traditional Dutch donuts only made around New Years!!  We saw them being sold all over the place and I tried a few bites at various free sample stations 🙂  Crispy on the outside and soft inside.

He was angry he didn’t get a whole one.

What else, what else…

We saw this brand of fast food where you put the money in the slot and then the little door opens and you take your food.  In theory it’s faster than waiting in line…

More walking down the winding streets on the first day:

We stopped in one of the famous Dutch cheese shops and while Luis actually bought sandwiches, I did some damage on these free samples.  SO MUCH CHEESE.

We took a quick walk through the Jewish Quarter.

And continued walking around, all over the place.  

Eventually we stopped for coffees and time to re-group.

And then continued our adventure in search for a supermarket (for breakfast goods) and then dinner.

For dinner, we stopped in a couple little hipster places (soup for me and burgers for Luis…which he shared because he’s a gentleman hah)

To finish off the night, we headed over to the all-famous RED LIGHT DISTRICT!  Oh my gosh, it was like nothing I had ever seen before.  From the abundance of “coffeeshops” a.k.a bars to smoke weed, to the mostly-naked women dancing in the windows, drawing in customers.  It was insane.

We spent a couple hours in a bar, watching families and groups of friends sitting around, smoking weed, and it’s completely normal.

Internet appropriate 😉

We were completely wiped (since we woke up at 4 am!) and headed home fairly early.  Day two hopefully coming soon, but it might not be up until next weekend!