It's 2010 and the man, no longer young, allegedly wiser, feels again the siren-call from his youth. He has loved, worked, played, but the memory of the sparkling lights still haunts his dreams. And now life mellows, the man has leisure to daydream of gentle waters flowing beneath ancient bridges. A child has grown to womanhood, and his self-imposed exile from the Promised Land draws to a close. Proper Citizen he never was, but protected the eyes of infancy must be. Love's price paid, the City of Sin reaches for him once more.....
A few brief words to the bride of his heart, and a fresh voyage will commence, the joyous past made new again! Yet, a caution sears his fervor. He has played the Jester too often, he will brook no more foolishness. The mysterious pathways of this Eden must be divined in advance, all delights anticipated, for therein lies the path to salvation in this Promised Land.
(The stories up to now have been old ones dredged out of my slow-roasted brain. A lot of details and none of the coffeeshop names or prices stayed with me, just a few highlights and lowlights. These newer trips I can recall most of them, even have some notes, and I'll fill that info in wherever I can. Hope it's not too much detail to be fun reading.)
Alright, I've been to my favourite place on Earth three times now, and managed to get it wrong in some way twice. It's NOT happening again
. Before I go I do research: I talk to friends for their experiences of the past. I read the Amsterdam map book I bought from cover to cover. I get books from the library. I read Dutch news(in English) on the net. I learn some Dutch. I chat (carefully) with my 3 Dutch neighbours. But most importantly; I learn the name, location and opening hours of every coffeeshop from Hoorn to Eindhoven. There is just no way in Hell that I'm coming back with both my lungs from this trip!
And then I discover the Cup. I thought I was only joking about the Holy Grail, but there it is
. So, I'm pretty much dumb-struck, I call the wife and point speechlessly at my computer screen. Within 5 minutes I'm looking up flights on the net, passports scattered across my desk. Okay, it's done, we're going, but I book for two weeks and she can only stay for one. No problem, I've got two buddies who will be very happy to make Amsterdam's acquaintance. The Mrs. and I will go over the week before the Cup(she didn't wish to attend) and my friends will join me for the Festivities. Brilliant 
! The Viking has been a couple of times before, but the BoyRacer is a newbie to Amsterdam. This should be fun!Trip time, November 2010: my wife and I are flying through London to Amsterdam, 10 or 11 hours before we make it there, I'm not staying sober that whole time! A half-dozen borrowed cookies set me straight(what an odd phrase to use...) and the flights went swimmingly. THIS time the hotel was booked (and confirmed, and re-confirmed). Strangely, I just read Craig Bell's very moving thread, and we were upgraded to the very same room he described. Great private balcony, but they've screwed the door shut in recent years (we got our own screwdriver, which is now in the ceiling panels directly above the pillows, if anyone needs it, but replace it please
). Will have to check if Craig's pipe is still behind the drainpipe when I go in February. But I digress.Day 1
The hotel was the Hem, and we arrived in poor weather. Anyone remember that huge windstorm and hail the week before the Cup in 2010? Our room faced the wind and we found water blowing through the window seals, running down the wall. The electric heater failed to operate and we were given a space-heater. Every time we turned it on the fuses blew out on half our floor
. This is the point were we got the upgrade to the room from Craig's narrative, #403. As he has said, it was very fine , huge space, balcony, giant room-length windows, and the Jacuzzi(which also got severely bumped later). Plus, the rooftop of the third floor is right in front of your windows and you can put your booze, etc,.out there to keep cool. Just watch out for the pigeons, they'll eat anything they can peck through! Lost some ice cream and cakes to the little horrors.Now, this time I'm prepped, I know there's De Kroon about 6 blocks east of me (not on the CS map, south of Hoofdorpplein), Bullwackie about 5 blocks north-east of me, and my glow is long gone after that game of musical hotel-rooms. It's time to find the real Amsterdam. De Kroon is a private type with mainly hash, buy and fly is the rule, but we bought a few g's of Cheese (about 9e each, I think) and they allowed us to stay for one round in their backroom. Nice smoke, a little bit harsh, but worked just fine. Great flavour (my first cheese taste), fair count, bought 3 more g's on the way out. Back to the hotel to unpack, blissfully wrecked
.Now we're dressed and ready to head out, the munchies have set in. The new room's nice and warm, and everybody's smiling. Bullwackie is the next stop, another buy and fly just a short walk away. The menu seems a bit thin, but we settle on a haze-type for the bride, it was around 11e. We roll a couple and walk. She liked it, got her up and active. We tram to the Leidseplein and stroll around for a restaurant. It's still rainy and chill, and we pick something close; the Italian food area east of McD's. Actually not bad for tourist-menu food, pasta and pizza were cheap and quick. I don't remember which place was first (ate at most of them before leaving), but I knew we were in a REAL Italian place. I knew it because we there several minutes before any of the staff or the owner could tear their eyes from the Italian football match on TV and notice us!
Great service once they looked up, though. Owner very friendly and joking constantly, served us himself. It might have been Mimo's, but don't quote me.Now, right next to these fine establishments was the Rokerij, this one being my favourite of the four we'd eventually find(alas, all gone now R.I.P.). Cool, dark decor, wall niches full of candles and Eastern statuettes. And not bad drinks either. I believe we bought lemon haze and more cheese. Stayed for awhile for the atmosphere and tea, liked the cheese better than De Kroon's, smoother, tastier. The bride's smoke is fine, she says. I have a hit and it's fairly sweet-citrus. Nice change-up to the rich, heavy taste of mine. We decide to move downtown now the rain has stopped and head for Centraal on the tram after a quick stop to split a Fries Swimming In Mayonnaise.
We bustle through the station crowds and walk towards Barney's on Haarlemmerstraat, but stop at the Greenhouse first. Some nice, really sticky black hash, can't remember what they called it, but it was 18e and stuck to the table the moment you let go of it. Later I'd bring something cold in with me, to put it against. Problematic to break up, being that sticky, but well worth it, strong and tasty with a lasting glow. The under-floor fish tank was a novelty, fun to watch while smoking. On to Barney's for the last shop of the evening. It was Crimea Blue and I believe it was the most powerful weed I saw that trip. Fast, strong high and tasty, but a little harsh. Came down hard and fast though (later in the trip I actually fell asleep before I could finish writing the date, on this stuff). Walked back to the tram for the midnight run home. Scattered the various left-overs on the room-desk for morning and crashed. Not too bad for a first day, considering my past efforts.
Day 2
Breakfast is served downstairs until 10, we stumble in at 9:50. There wasn't a lot left, but better than nought. We do some grocery shopping at the mall across the highway, roll a few from yesterday's leavings and walk to the Vondelpark. It's chilly, but there is almost a meter of snow on the ground back home, so we're still pleased. Burn a couple beside the lake, on that big slanting tree, then a stop for tea and hot chocolate at The Blue Tea House in the park. We're off to the Hard Rock Cafe for lunch and overpriced drinks, after a short look at the fellows playing on the giant outdoor chess-board in front. Some interesting signed instruments on the walls, guitars, etc. The Rokerij is our next stop, near the Leidseplein, and we buy Lemon Skunk (about 10e). This was disappointing because it was so sour, I thought I was buying a sweet one like the haze from earlier. The buzz was fine, but not the taste. Ended up mixing it in with other sweeter things and I could still taste it coming through! Instead I bought more cheese.
A day of sight-seeing now, in the rain, but we'd brought umbrellas. Dinner at a steak house on Brouwersgracht, supermarket trip for ice cream and cakes (read earlier about pigeons), then to Barney's for more Crimea Blue and something haze-like for her. To the Greenhouse for more sticky black hash and put it with the ice cream. It's kind of early by Amsterdam standards, but we're tired and head back to the hotel for a smoke-in and early night.
Day 3 to 7
We did a lot more of this same thing. Explored the Jordaan and coffeeshops Spirit, Paradox, Grey Area, Amnesia, etc, etc. Next day started in Rembrandtplein and explored towards De Pijp, Albert Cuyp market and coffeeshops Rokerij, Smokey's, Bushdoctor, Barney's Lounge,Mellow Yellow,etc, etc. Never found Katsu, though, I read on this forum that it's a great place, will look this next trip. We walked all the road-route into town from the Hem one day, not through the park. Long walk, but lots to see, we love the old buildings and stained glass windows. We found the City Hall market and coffeeshops Reefer (with the cool below-ground seating), Bluebird, Basjoe, Rusland, etc, etc.
Somewhere in here we found the place that would eventually become our favourite coffeeshop in Amsterdam to this day, and it was Voyagers. It wasn't on the map back then, looked kind of dingy from outside, but we heard laughter coming from the BT and the seats were full(both good omens). Strolled in, were treated very friendly, BT cheerfully showed and explained any strain we asked about. We bought Amnesia Haze, and this might have been the time (or the next trip in six months) we got that most delicious strain of all; Purple Strawberry Bliss was the name, I believe. I was told it later got renamed Shoreline, but haven't tasted that yet. It smelled and tasted like a strawberry milkshake, Yummy! Good buzz too. I still rave about it. I did a lot of business here with various Kush and Haze strains over the next ten days, or so.
So a few more days like this and my bride headed back to the Frozen North. She'd smoked herself out, and had business back home, anyhow. The Viking and BoyRacer were due the next day and we were all sharing a room on the Rembrandtplein. I spent a quiet night packing up and making notes for the guys. I had managed to save a small taste of everything with notes on strength, taste, buzz-length, etc. for each.
(part 2 coming tonight, stay tuned...
)
. The poor, deluded sod fancies himself a country singer, so much so that he brings his own backing CD's of music for the karaoke bars he plans on attending. The Viking and I are old Rockers, you're not getting us near a karaoke bar! So we take him up to the top of Zeedijk to a club owned by this Asian family and bugger off for Voyagers. A few hours later I go check up on him and he's hammered, still karaoke singing and made friends with 8 drunken Englishman, who all think he's one of those few Judges that get given the entries to sample for free. They are literally genuflecting to him as they roll the next joint(jokingly). I stay long enough to puff one with them and go back out. BoyRacer's doing fine, he'll probably be Mayor by the time I get back 
! We stop to burn one at that spot where Zeedijk touches the canal, at the top of the RLD, but it wasn't a good idea because BoyRacer's wobbling badly now. Going through the Nieuwmarkt we start south down the canal towards the Rembrandtplein and almost lose him in the canal twice and down a set of stairs once before we steer him across the bridge and to the hotel. 
. You get strange looks from people when you're being followed and photoed like this.
