DC wrote:This is as close as I could find and it still doesn't do your picture any justice, I suggest ya copyright it and get in touch with the vatican.
Hey DC....here's a photo of that photo ...not the best with the camera but, you can see that I look nothing like the chap in your pic.
The tapping once again awakens us, this time neither of us attempt to converse with the lady as she peeks around the door and disappears. LittleD is up like a flash and into the bathroom which leaves me to test out the kettle situation. Still buzzing from yesterday and with a mouth so dry I'm about to croak, I switch the dreaded machine on.....damn, light show again....I'm livid, I dress quickly and storm down to the reception desk, faulty kettle in hand. After a bit of blustering and waving of said kettle from me the calm young lady at the desk tells me they checked this and found nothing wrong, then she asks, sweetly, if I am activating the electrical system when I enter the room????? What?!?!?! No one spoke of this when we were checking-in two days ago or mentioned it when discussing this problem. Apparently, one must insert the key card in a slot next to what I miss-took for a thermostat. I have never had to do this in any hotel I've stayed at before, in fact, I've never heard of it before coming to A'Dam. Subdued, I grab the elevator and nip up to the room for coffee and Bailey's....the way a day in A'Dam is supposed to start. Any day for that matter. I insert the card and all is well in room 213. LittleD makes coffee, digs the grinder out of my coat and rolls joints from our pile of coffeeshop baggies whilst I do a quick SSS.
Over coffee and Bailey's we sit and discuss the last couple of days and come to the conclusion that we have been just like two little kids in a candy store/sweetshop....wanting and grabbing everything we see or smell, hence the large number of half bags in front of us. We have to calm down a bit so, we load up our pockets with pre-rolls, papers, baggies and the trusty grinder and head out to Popeye's for the late breaky. Sticking to our decision to cut down on purchases , we just order the full English and coffee, park our butts upstairs on the rail and fire up joints of unknown combinations. I had stashed a couple of mini bottles in a pocket so we enjoyed a nice coffee and joint before the food arrived. Once again I found Popeye's to be a pleasant and friendly spot to enjoy a good beaky in a comfortable atmosphere.
The previous evening at the Nes I had meet a chap who was a bud tender at Coffeeshop 36, nice job!!, so that seemed like a good first destination for a early Saturday afternoon stop. The grinder flashes, our pre-roles are restocked and we're off.
As we stroll across the top of town we both remake on the large number of groups of what I shall call kids, we are seeing pouring out of Central Station. And how many more cops there are about also. This is a fantastic route to walk, the architecture is amazing, the whole scene....with trams, cars, pedestrians and hundreds of bikes all in what appears to be utter chaos, yet I don't hear horns honking in outrage or tires screeching in terror, it just works it's self out....some how!! We are standing, puffing our joints, in awe of the scene before us when LittleD spots two cops paying a little to much attention to us....LittleD has an eye for these things.... I guess they must have smelt our joints. As they start towards us, we simultaneously discard our roaches, crush them with the right foot, turn left and wander away. It must have looked rehearsed as we walked off laughing. Back in Canada those cops would have been all over the pair of us.
Coffeeshop 36 is easily located and we enter to find it fairly full, the only seats are at the tables in front of the drinks counter. This is a large shop and nicely laid out. The chap I met at Nes is not at the bud bar and before we know what happened, I have a gr of White Russian and LittleD has a gr each of Black Afghani and Blond Leb. May as well get a coffee and sit for a puff now. Second coffeeshop and we're both buying more. Someone once said, "I can resist everything, except temptation". This is the best ventilated shop we have visited so far. As I said, the place is almost full and the air is not thick with the smoke of so many joints. We have coffees and puff some of the black in a small, glass pipe that LittleD produces from his coat pocket....he picked it up at some head shop we had passed. The music is not the best, more of the same....boom, boom....we puff a joint of the WR, roll for the road and we're gone. I must say, that by this point in the trip I'm having trouble tasting any difference between the strains of pot and hash that we are smoking. Taste buds becoming numbed by the shear quantity I figure.
The plan is to wander out to the Resistance Museum near the Artis Zoo with a stop at Bluebirds on the way there and Greenhouse Namaste and Dampkring on the way back....ambitious I know, loads of walking but this is a wonderful city to roam around in....so many beautiful buildings to see and new things to witness, all while puffing joints of outstanding pot. Somehow, between the poorly printed ACD map (printer was running out of ink) and me having only the one good eye for navigating, we become lost....yet again we find ourselves somewhere off the ACD map, but the eastside this time. I come to the monumental conclusion that we should get a bigger map, LittleD thinks we should not walk so far that we need one. We locate a map and are soon standing in front of the museum, which is closed for the winter. What a researcher I am, had the address, had checked the museum site, knew how much it cost to get in.....but never looked at the opening dates, looked at the opening times, but not the dates. IDIOT. We puff a couple and amble off laughing. To hell with the long way back, it's a bee-line we're on and it runs straight to Basjoe's....I know that's open!!! The volume of bikes that we see on the way, once again, astounds me.
Fists bumps with James, coffees and a gr of Bas Special and we settle for a well earned rest period. After a few joints and another coffee the talk turns to food, real food I insist. We RFR (roll for road) and head out for red meat....steak and potatoes, wine, dessert, mmmmm....my mouth is watering. Perhaps a swift half at The Nes first, purely medicinal....to whet the appetite!! No need for a map, we know this route well.
I'll end this post here and promise to get the rest of the day up this evening after dinner.
Thanks Kermit,
I'm loving writing....as many have stated in trip reports, one gets to relive the trip by telling the story.
As to the photo, yes that is me....March 1970, I was 19 and was preparing to marry the Sept. of that year and needed a Canadian passport/citizenship hence, that pic is on my Cerificate of Canadian Citizenship....what a hoot when I flash that as this is me at the airport before we left.
Alot changed then m8, again top report and i have to say probably one of the most hardcore reports i have read to date. The combination of booze and weed has amazed me
We had spotted some places advertising Argentine beef and on the walk to The Nes we noted the location of a couple of likely ones. Upon enquiring at the bar if DC is around, we find that he is playing pool down back, he comes over and I finally get to introduce myself and meet the elusive DC....damn, this was our third visit in as many days. I was drinking Culpener(sic) by now, not finding the Leffe Blond to my liking. One half led to another, etc, as it does, accompanied by a few of our pre-rolled, mystery combos, a good intro chat with DC and my thoughts return to food. While LittleD and I are deciding when and where to eat, DC informs us that he ordering from the 'famous'....that is on this forum anyway....Burger Bar and do we want something. Well, hell yes....just make it what ever you are having, we reply. Now I must be in some form of heaven, I'm sitting in a public bar in A'Dam, sucking Culpener, puffing joints and the best damn burger in The Dam is on it's way. I will cast my vote in favour of these burgers, mine was one of the finest that I have had, it was also one of the messiest that I've had....nice save with the stack of napkins DC and a great call on the burger order. It's so nice to finish ones meal and fire-up a joint without having to be skulking around behind the pub in some filthy alley.
A few more beers and joints, we managed to empty a couple more baggies, and I was once again blasted. Stumbled out, across the square and into the hotel. Thank Dad (see photos above) that there's an elevator, I would not be able to manage the stairs, found my bed and I was done.
Yeah, you look nothing like him....only Mary could tell ya apart!. As for the leffe, while drinking 8-9 pints of an 8% beer is enough to put most off, smoking joints with and still being able to walk back to the hotel after, can deffinately be regarded as a miracle!!.
DC wrote:Yeah, you look nothing like him....only Mary could tell ya apart!. As for the leffe, while drinking 8-9 pints of an 8% beer is enough to put most off, smoking joints with and still being able to walk back to the hotel after, can deffinately be regarded as a miracle!!.
LMAO....
8% those Leffe? No wonder!! I didn't think I had drank that many beers....I sure has hell felt like I had, almost falling off the stool in Stone's for instance!...
See, no miracles!!!! Just an old guy with fading memory/beer capacity, drunk and very high.
Peaceful, uninterrupted sleep. Seems one of us had finally worked out to put the "Do not disturb" sign on the door. My monies on LittleD. Peaceful, uninterrupted sleep means that it is even later than usual when we exit the front door, what with showering, coffeeing(sic) and rolling we now have to hurry to make Popeye's by 2:00pm....Shameful!! We did manage to leave a couple of empty baggies in the hotel wastebasket though.
When we walk into Popeye's the owner orders two full English for us before we get to the bud bar, where we grab a gr of Super Silver Haze. Breakfast was nicely timed, once again, and after we rolled the rest of the gr for the road we were off to find Anne Franks house, once again!!! LittleD led the way on this expedition, armed with the new map....I thought, seems he didn't grab it on the way out so, it's back to the poorly printed ACD map. I don't know if LittleD was using the same one eyed navigation technique as I was or whether it was the joints we were smoking on the way, but we were lost, once again. Not off the map lost, this time, but still lost....Well done LittleD??? We discuss just taking a photo of any likely house and he can tell his wife that it's the Anne Frank house but were soon back on track. We came around the corner and were met by what appeared to be hundreds and hundreds of people....all milling about, taking photos and forming lines. We had found it. The Anne Frank house....it is pandemonium around there so I tell LittleD that if he wants to go in, I'll see him later tonight at Nes. He thinks about that for a micro-second, takes a few pictures and we are on the stroll to Tweede Kamer.
Funny how we couldn't find this huge tourist attraction yet, we wander right to the door of most of the coffeeshops we have sought. This shop is tiny and packed, the only seats are at the windows to the left of the door. LittleD crams himself in there and I grab a gr of G13xHaze, coffees and return to lever myself in. I realized at this point that we had missed Paradox....Damn. Not only is this shop small it's also dark, so I open the curtains, which are almost rubbing my nose, to let in some light to roll by. The BT comes right over and closes them, telling us that they don't want people looking in (fair enough)....the grinder doesn't exactly flash and I roll in the dark while disco/hip hop/dance music thumps out off the sound system. As we puff our joints LittleD is concerned about catching the curtains on fire, being that they are so close, and we are soon laughing our butts off. Between the music and the cramped quarters we were soon on the road, didn't even RFR (roll for road).
Down the canal and turn right, cross three canals and Dolphins was where it was supposed to be. A gr of Northern Lights and a hot chocolate for me, LittleD gets a gr Jamaican, a gr Skunk and hot chocolate. We noticed quiet a few kids had entered and headed down stairs while we made the above purchases so, we sat at the counter and put the grinder to work on the contents of our new baggies. Really nice lady BT, we chatted a while, puffed a few and some of the kids exited so we went down the perilous stairs....at my age anyway....and found a booth where we settled in and rolled a couple of mixed fatties. The music was much better here and we enjoyed the joints, hot chocolates and great coffeeshop. After another drink we RFR and roamed off in search of food.
I wanted steak, DC had mentioned a spot (forget the the name now) which I had spotted earlier and I was heading straight there. Upon viewing the menu displayed out front LittleD wants to go down the road and pay only half the price for twice the amount, besides this place 'looks to fancy'!! I tell him you get what you pay for and go in for my steak. He goes down the road. I'm seated in the window (I love to watch the world go about it's business) and order a glass of white wine, I believe the waiter spots the fact that I'm baked and suggests my potato the same way along with a good cut of beef. I enjoy the salad, the soup, the beef and the wine....when the waiter asks if I would like dessert, I tell him I have some Blue Berry Cheese for just that purpose, he is still chuckling when he returns with the bill.
I stroll the RLD enjoying my 'dessert', discreetly of course, and eventually find myself heading towards....you guessed it....the Nes. LittleD is seated at the bar, puffing his glass pipe full hash and chatting to DC when I walk in. We spend a few hours talking about our great experiences in A'Dam, puffing, laughing, drinking Gulpener, puffing and generally enjoying ourselves. Empty yet a few more bags into the grinder, RFR and head for Basjoe's....only to discover it's almost 1:00am and we'll never make it so, we just roam around the city at night puffing our roadies and laughing. After grabbing some Frites it's back to the hotel to enjoy them with a night cap, where we find that we are winning the coffeeshop baggie war....we have less than we started the day with.
A day well spent.
ramble on