It's the first day of August when we leave for Amsterdam. My birthday month. Full moon in Leo as well, my star sign. I am feeling like a slightly befuddled and tired leonine creature. I've not been sleeping well, a byproduct of menopause, the waking in the middle of the night ready for...what, I don't know but I'm fully awake for a couple of hours on watch duty and then fall asleep just in time to wake up and move on. The partner snores softly but I like total silence so he has brought a portable speaker and has purchased the calm App, which gives us a choice of different white noise. We have chosen crickets and up to now, it has been working but now it's not as effective. He is disheartened, I am slightly grumpy.
I've been to Amsterdam once before and it was memorable because we stayed on a houseboat in the winter and I remember waking up and looking out at the swans and ducks - that overrode all other memories. This time all I can smell as we walk from the station to our hotel, is the pungent odour of marijuana, we also find out it's Gay Pride weekend. The town is at capacity and full of wonderfully interesting people in dress up mode.
I've booked a very cool motel which later I find in other cities, in other countries - Motel One, worth looking them up. We have the day together before the partner heads off for a family occasion in England. We wander into the old Jewish markets which were famous in their day but are now pretty junky.
We're on the hunt for herrings again, we find a little shop in the narrow streets and the partner has his last plate and I go for the baby prawns again. Afterwards, we find a bar that has been operating since 1712! I can just imagine the people back then, the clothes, the bar maids, the jugs of ale; I have stepped back into another time.
On the way in, the partner is again studying the paving, I've gone inside and am absorbing hundreds of years of history. Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus is very applicable now. My late husband was the same, looking at the plumbing while I'm staring at a medieval sculpture.
Every second shop in the centre is either a cheese or porcelain shop. I love the tulip vases and we both love the cheese shops as there are free samples. We try them all. We come across an amazing arcade of mosaics as we walk back but then Google maps lead us slightly astray and we end up in the Red Light District. I'm following the prompts only to look up to see the half naked girls in their cubicles in the narrow alleyways. It's hard not to look. It's hard not to get high on the whiffs of weed that float down the tiny alleyways.
The partner leaves that night for England and after that, back to Australia. We say our farewells and I settle in to my room. After all the weed vapour I've inhaled throughout the day, you would think I could count on a decent night's sleep. And it happens! (Although I do miss the crickets). Perhaps menopausal women should hang out in Amsterdam.
Breakfast is organic and healthy and I head off through a fine mist of rain, past the late nighters who haven't been home, past an amazing liquor shop with an array of Cannabis liquors and cannabis flavoured beers and other retro packaged beautiful bottles. I buy a couple of fruit liquors worried that I may get waylaid at customs with the weed varieties, and then find my way, slightly dampened, to the station.
Amsterdam Centraal was built in 1882 on 3 interconnected artificial islands created from sand taken from the North Sea Canal constructions. It's a Gothic/ Renaissance masterpiece, the interior is superb. It's so easy to get trains anywhere in the Netherlands and their pride in punctuality is big here according to the train inspectors who check their watches often.
I'm off to Naples where I'll meet the daughter and where we'll catch a ferry to the island of Ischia for my birthday. I still can't believe how blase I am now about travelling on trains, planes and ferries. As long as I'm there hours before, I can handle anything.
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