Because our new apartment is in the center of town, there is quite a bit of street noise and light in our new bedroom. Mark has had some difficult sleeping and as a result he's really exhausted.... but we decided to take our planned weekend trip to Amsterdam anyway.

Spending a weekend in Amsterdam has been a high priority for us for a number of reasons. First, it's the largest city in our "home country" of the Netherlands and a tourist favorite. And secondly, the transportation is easy despite the fact that we still don't have a car. We attempted to take this trip at the end of December, but all the "budget hotels" were full and we didn't want to spend the money for a midrange hotel while Heide was still out of work. This was the next best weekend for us and cheap hotel rooms were available. After Mark finished work, we headed North.

Our hotel of choice was the "cheap" Hotel Winston. We had seen this hotel on several travel shows. It's big attraction is that it's right in the heart of the red light district and it has "Art Rooms." These "Art Rooms" are apparently custom rooms done by a particular artist and they're all supposed to be quirky, unique and well,... a bit strange! We were up for it, but when we checked in... apparently all the "Art rooms" were full and we were stuck with a "normal" room. Well,... this "normal" room was at the very front of the hotel right over the well-used hotel entrance. The window was next to the neon illuminated hotel sign and the pub downstairs played VERY loud pop music until 4 in the morning. Mark's comment, "We are cursed!"  We were trying to escape the noise and light of our new bedroom and this is what we ended up with!! Such is life.

Still, we were in Amsterdam!!  We went out for a walk in search of a pub called De Zeeman, recommended by Mark's colleagues. Passing through the red light district was an eye opener for me! The prostitutes in their glass fronted rooms lit by red neon lights were right there, almost close enough to reach out and touch. You could look right into their eyes and I'm sure they could hear all the inappropriate comments made by some of the inebriated/ stoned tourists.