So after food and beer coma, we wake up at 8am the next morning to go see tulips at Keukenhof. Little did we know that it takes a series of trains and a crowded tourist bus to get the flowers, but in the end it was completely worth it! There's really no way to describe the park. The entrance kind of reminds you of Kings Dominion, except there are no roller coasters, and there are just a ton of flowers and clogs...so really nothing like Kings Dominion I guess but it just had the same feel.
Moving on, Diana and I decide to skip and hold hands while singing "We're Off to see the Wizard." Then a couple walks by with a cute little dog and I proceed to yell "Toto!" Pictures are really the only way to describe this park with endless colored flowers, but it is definitely unlike anything I have seen before.
After tulips we go to get lunch at a pancake house. The menu has something called fantasy pancakes, so we spend the next 10 minutes debating whether or not there are drugs in them. We all order these pancakes with tomatoes and cheese and they turn out to be strange crepe like bread with burnt cheese and soggy tomatoes and I wanted to go get a box of Aunt Jemima and show them how a real pancake is made...but instead I just ate it.
Then it comes time for the Heineken factory, probably one of the highlights of the trip. For a marketing major, this factor is like a big case study toy shop. Diana and I decide to create videos of ourselves doing Dutch kareoke and even managed to send a picture to Brad Brown. He replied to our message with a "I'm glad you guys are learning so much. There is also a Van Gogh museum and Anne Frank house that you might want to check out."
The best part of the tour is the end where they give you two glasses of Heineken at the bar. We ran out of drink tickets so the bartenders just started giving us drinks for free. By the end we were all out of tickets so I went up to the bar and told them that I ran out of drinks but it was my birthday. He asked how many I wanted, so I said "six!" and not only did I get six icy cold beers, but they also told me to get on the bar so they could sing. Naturally I accepted his offer and they shushed the whole bar and had them sing happy birthday to me. At the end I found myself with two more beers, one in each hand.
Then we went out for birthday drinks, and decided to do a drink at each bar since we were still stuck in our pub crawl mode from Brussels. We ended the night with a midnight birthday McFlurry called Strogenwaffle or something like that. It was pretty epic! I tried to ask the guy if he would put in two toppings because it was my birthday (I figured it worked at Heineken, so why not?), but he frowned and said that it was not allowed. It was probably for the best because Strongenwaflesaidl was the most epic McFlurry I've ever had.
The next morning we went to the Anne Frank house which was really amazing. I had already been before, but it was nice to see it again. We also visited the Van Gogh museum which I had seen before as well. Some of the paintings were gone for restoration or something, so that was a little bit of a bummer but we still got to take our time to look at everything. Obviously we had to end the day with another Kriek on the canal and pictures with the Iamsterdam sign.
Overall, probably one of the best birthdays I've ever had...not to mention I got to spend my 21st in Amsterdam.
Italy and Istanbul stories coming soon!!
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