Long time reader (since researching my first trip to Amsterdam over five years ago) but first time poster. This forum has given me quite a wealth of information that has been greatly appreciated when arranging my smoking holidays to Holland, so I decided to leave my opinions on whats hot and whats not ATM in the 'Dam. Hopefully they will steer people in the right directions to having a quality Amsterdam holiday
I went on this trip with a group of 8 Friends, one of whom is CSD forum member True Playa.
Arrived early from Schipol and after dropping our stuff at the apartment above stones cafe the first place we hit was...
Sheeba - Can't remeber going to this coffeeshop on previous visits (thats not to say I didn't though!) but would return again. Probably the friendliest bud-tender I met all trip, was very patient and happy to show everyone in our group different strains multiple times, due to the small amount of room in front of the dealers bar. He also let me off a Euro from my purhcase, which was nice. Brought a bag of their Bubblegum and Nepal Cream. Bubblegum had a nice flavour, better than any of the examples I have at home, and a good high to start the day before getting stuck into the heavier stuff. Nepal cream was nice, stank when smoked over most of the greens, wasn't too impressed with the high at first but definet creeper that was a lost stronger than it first appeared.
Next went to the Stones coffeeshop (I think anyway) and I got some of their Premium Princes Pollen (not sure of the exact title). Was pricey (again I can't recall spceifics) but was very nice, light in colour and oily Gave a strong high that was good for walking round the city.
Next visit was the Hunters bar, where I purchased some of there So Gouda. Was the only thing that really smacked me in the face from their slection in terms of flavour, as soon as the bud-tender opended the tupperware you could smell it reeking across the bar
One of the tastiest blazes I brought all trip, full flavour behaviour from start to finish, and nice buds aswell Next went and chilled in Green place for a few vapourisers and spliffs. A lot of good stuff on the menu here, between our group we bought quite a lot of stuff from here over our three days excursion. I purchased the OG Kush on this visit, and in terms of strength this was one of the Highlights of the trip. Full on mind and body onslaught, sinking into the chair but cerebal aswell. I really liked the taste, tasted like nothing I has smoked before, but some of my friends found it a bit strange. Also again this place had really pleasant staff. English guy who works in there is sound chatted to him for a while when I was loading some vapourisers, could tell he enjoyed his job and was relaxed with all the punters.
Next place we hit was Grey area. Again really sound staff and good knowledge of their product. Menu was not was extensive as I had wished and there was a few things I was hoping for they didn't have. Got a gram of the L.A woman, buds looked great best formed out of all the things i looked at in there. Not amazing flavour though, just kind of "skunky" for lack of a better generic term. Good late afternoon smoke to rest up before the evening missons. Brought the munchies on Nicely
Next we went to Homegrown fantasy. looked at a few things and decided on the Silver Pearl. Again one of the top hitters for taste on the trip, so nice on the pallet and a smooth smoke. Strong uplifitng sativa buzz that lasted for ages and set me up for the inevitable hectic coffeeshop crawl. Other things my friends got from here that were worht mentioning were the Cheese and Citral, both smelt phenomonal and the flavour of the cheese...damn! Ended up buying some of that myself.
Next purchase was Crimea Blue from barneys. Bit dissapointed with this and the barneys menu on the whole. Were out of a lot of stuff (g13, dr grinspoon, hawiian snow) but had wanted to try the crimea since reading about it. Brought a bag on got some Vapourisers on the go. Nothing special in the taste, was more of a generic taste than a more pronounced flavour I had expected from the genetics. Only purchase I made from Barneys the whole trip. I like how it looks inside now though, a digi vapouriser on every table is big! Rerturned to smoke and use the vapourisers a fair few times.
Next it was down the road to Dampkring 2, where after high reccomendation from people on here, bought some of the Riffman Habbib (sp?). Was not disspointed, strength and flavour both un believable, only time I came close the whole trip to freaking out a bit from being toooo fucked haha. overtook all the other smokes from the day. This was highly reccomended. Bud-tender was a bit of a mardy git though, and took ages to serve us talking to his mate. Had a very high and mighty attitude. Lady behind the drinks counter was sound though and came upstairs to see if we were ok etc, so that counter balanced it a bit.
Crossed over into Poppeyes after finishing in the Dampkring. Have never visited before due to it looking a bit tacky compared to the other smoke spots in the area. How wrong was I!!! Visited after reading good reviews on here and will definetly be back. Great menu of weed and hash, best examples of vanilla and pink kush i saw all trip (Amnesia's pink kush was waste), Alladins cholocate was amazing, good prices, friendly staff and was comforatable. A favourtie visit of all the people I went with. Vanilla kush flavour was immense, made barneys example look tragic. Big up popeyes! And a free Hooka hit of all there weeds mixed when you purchase...result!!!
Thats the end of day one. Will right up two and three later as do not have time now. Hope you enjoy what I wrote so far
08/03/2010
Hey, just got round to writing the end section of my trip report so here it is...
Day two –
Was up at 8, showered and ready to smoke until I choked. Had some bags unfinished from the day before, and purchases still to make. Met another member of out group who had flown in a day later due to work commitments, and we were on our way.
First stop was HGF for first attempt at the aforementioned cheese purchased, unfortunately they had ran out the previous evening and needed a re-stock, bud-tender said if that was what we had primarily come to purchase and he would have a fresh batch in an hour. Champion!
Got a stomp on to go Barneys for a vaporiser session and to see if they had in any of the strains they had not has the day before. Most essential for me was the Hawaiian Snow. Had wanted to try this bad boy for a while now due from reviews on here, looking at pictures on the net, and my friend who loves the smoke just as much as me highly recommended it from a previous trip . Unfortunatley they had none of this still. My friend who had joined us purchased some of the Red Diesel, which was very nice IMO. One of the tastiest Diesels of the trip (between out group I think we had over 7 “Diesel” related strains and crosses) and definitely worth having a look at if your in Barneys.
EDIT – Also, on the way to Barneys from HGF we stopped at a Coffeeshop on the left hand side as the road curves that I don’t think has been open on my previous visits, and it looked quite recently done up, but I can’t remember it’s name (can anybody jog my memory?) Anyway we stopped in for a look at the menu, was decidedly average, their top purchase being their “nameofcoffeeshopthaticantremember-haze”. But this just appeared to be very similar to super silver haze that I can get at home pretty regularly, and looked the same as the SSH/Amnesia hazes in other coffee shops. The same could be said for Basjoes heaven haze as well…! I’m getting the impression, from my own observations and speaking to people that work at coffee shops that this happens a lot? If so why, is rebranding allowed just to get idiots/or just un-educated novices to buy the same strain under a different name. It’s not very cool really… (If I am wrong please correct me but this does seem to be the case.)
Stopped in popeyes again on the walk and more purchases of Vanilla Kush and Pink Kush were made. Then we went to Hill Street Blues and relaxed for a bit, played a few games of pool. They were playing some nice chilled hip-hop when we went in which was cool as I was yet to hear any hip-hop in the coffeshops we had visited and I love to listen to it when blazed. This that then turned into an hour long mix of jungle and drum and bass, of which the selection was top notch (I mix drum and bass in my spare time so I appreciated this quite a lot), and the some dub and reggae. Three of my favorite genres b2b!
I’m mentioning Hill Street Blues as although we didn’t purchase anything from there, we chilled there for a few hours at least every day. It is definitely one of the best hangouts in the main central smoking areas. If you get the big couches at the back near the windows you have the cushty set up!!! Very reasonably priced as well, best Hot Chocolates I tried all trip (the ones they serve in there for like 2 Euros would set you back nearer four in most places), good toasties, very friendly female staff, and they let you smoke your purchases from other places. All of these things score top points as a reason to visit somewhere in my book, as after all your in Amsterdam to relax, right?
After this went back to the Apartment for some munch, pick up more money and a quick hour re-charge of the batteries. After this we went back to the Green Place for a smoke and some Vaporizers (I could literally not get enough of these this trip!!! Need to buy one for home, just so damn pricey…)
I bought some of the Trainwreck this time round. It was recommended by the bud-tender as his purchase of choice, and said that although it was more reasonably priced (10 Euro a gram, compared to the 14 for the O.G Kush I had previously purchased, the Head bang for 15 and Casey Jones for around this mark up to) but still kept up with them in terms of strength. I had also had a couple of strains claiming to be this at home (one of which was V nice) so I wanted to see how they compared.
Loaded the best part of a G in a joint. I was absolutely battered after that, one of my top recommendations for strength if you doing your trip on a bit of budget. Very heavy high, you can see where it gets it’s name from, it did feel like a train had ran over my face (in a good way though…) And it was similar enough for me to say that one of the locally grown versions I got at home was pretty good, same taste but not as strong as the GP version, which is to be expected.
After this we ended up on some next level wild goose chase looking for Mellow Yellow, as they (allegedly) had some strains people wanted to try. Ended up trekking around for over an hour in the freezing cold looking for it (stoners great sense of direction combined with the inconceivable fact that we couldn’t possibly be lost…) When we finally got there, nothing looked that great at all. Was looking forward to seeing the Sleazestick (sp?) but that looked terrible, very wisp buds. Forum member True Playa purchased some Top Floor I think which he recommended and I do remember being nice, but on a whole not worth the long-arse trek for sweet fuck all! And there were no seats to chill so we didn’t even stay.
On the way back toward central and the red-light district, we stopped by Stix (after some more fannying around being lost). Menu was very bland nothing I wanted. So we just purchased a drink and relaxed for a spliff. Well I say relax, the seats in that place are abysmal. Most un-comfy coffeshop by far, including all the ones with stalls. And the lady at the bar was very rude, my friend said goodbye to her and she just barked at him to close the door behind his as we left. Suffice to say, won’t be visiting there again ever.
After this we went to HGF again, and the cheese was back in abundance! Got a bag of that with some prime nuggets in. Looked and smelled out of this world!!! I’m able to get cheese at home from time to time, and some of it is very nice, some of it is not, but I think I have only had stuff that came anywhere near to this on a few occasions, and I think they were imports from Dam’ anyway. 100% look at this if your in HGF, if its only half has good as when I saw it you will want it.
Halfway through my spliff Cheese I noticed snow pouring down from the sky. Excellent, I was really hoping it would snow while I was here. It had done on a previous visit, and there was something really nice about sitting in a coffeeshop with a big zoot, hot chocolate, watching the snow fall outside.
When the snow had thinned a little bit we went and re-grouped as a few people had split off to do different stuff, and then we went to bluebird. Having got the fever for the flavor from HGF, I got some of there Blue Cheese, which was also of a very high order. Again similar to the Blue Cheese I can get a home, but this just had the edge on raw stinkyness. Highly recommend you have a look at this if you visit.
Blue bird was again a coffeeshop I had not visited previously, but would go to again. Nice interior décor to look at when cained, lots and lots of vapourises, and there waffles and pancakes are very nice. Also the blonde lady who worked in there was cool as hell, and came and chatted to us for a bit while she was on her break.
After relaxing in here for a few hours, we went back to Barneys and Green places area of town. Barneys was full and still no Hawaiian Snow the bud-tender on this time told me they didn’t do at all anymore, yet the other two said they would be getting back but didn’t know when. Conflicting info from what is supposed to be a very “professional” Coffeeshop.
Went into Popeyes for a couple more spliffs and waited for some people, then we all went to greenhouse as they had enough seats for us all. They had no Hawaiian snow either, and hadn’t when I looked the previous day. Had a look at some of the Hashes, and decided on their ice-o-lator, wanted to buy some and looked the nicest out of the ones I looked at, strong and flavorsome but a tickler (this may be me being over zealous though and making too hencher spliffs for my own good haha.)
Has chilled in there for about an hour, and I went to look at one of my purchases under the scope at the bud tender table. Had finished my little trychome crystal – porn display when I noticed that the sticker for unavailable had been removed from Hawiian Snow!!! CHAMPION! Got the bud-tender to show it me and god-damn it looked as good as I had been hoping for. Got a bag straight away but wanted to save it for my mornings first smoke, a nice hard sativa wake and bake.
When green-house closed it was back to the apartment for a few more zoot’s and then bed.
Day 3 –
Got up again real early, and were in the coffeshops smoking by nine. Got my wake and bake of hawiian snow through a Vapouriser and that set me up for the day.
Nothing to exciting to report in terms of purchases this day, went halves on a few bags but on the whole was having to roll pretty big spliffs all day to get through all my previous buys (there were more than I have mentioned here, these are the one’s I remember as I wrote them down, but have now got a blank of all the stuff I didn’t take note of). Chilled in Hill Street Blues mainly, had a bit of stumble about. A few people went shopping and to chance there luck at sending packages home.
Had my last two joints outside the airport, one of cheese and one O.G kush, lovely. What is the deal with smoking on the street in Holland btw? There were a few people smoking J’s outside the airport, and I know people on here have done it due to reading trave-reports, but some of my friends swear you are not supposed to do it just out and about, and you never see people really walking around the center smoking spliffs…
Anyway, that’s my report over, best trip to Amsterdam ever, shame it was only three days. I hope you enjoyed my write up (spelling and grammar mistakes aside :s) I will have another one for you after I go back in may.
