Day 19 Saturday 

We received an email last night informing us that there were changes to our train timetable for today, therefore we got up early, had a quick breakfast and headed to the station to investigate. 

The customer service desk was easy to find but the person at the desk was very abrupt. Our journey today is complicated we change trains several times and our original timetable said there was a bus replacing the train at one point. Eventually the customer service advisor understood what I was trying to explain and he printed off a new itinerary for us. No bus now but there would be four changes of train with not much time between stops, just 6 or 8 minutes. John would go ahead and I would make it by the skin of my teeth. ​

It was the most difficult journey of our whole trip, even though it would take us 6 hours we couldn’t really settle on any train because of the frequent changes. The scenery was very flat and the same for miles and miles. ​

It was a dash from one train to another and we were pleased to see Amsterdam station. 

Finding our hotel wasn’t too difficult, John bought a tourist map which made it easy as it was a straight road from the station. We found our room, had a cup of tea and a rest then went out to experience Amsterdam on a warm Saturday evening. ​

It was very busy everywhere and every 10 minutes or so we came to a canal and junctions of roads, we just went with the flow of the people. On most of the streets there was a heady atmosphere coming from the many shops that sold “seeds”, many cafes had signs that said they sold cannabis and there were advertisements for magic mushrooms and an assortment of other substances that are legal to be sold in Amsterdam. We didn’t try anything, just wandered around experiencing the strange world of Amsterdam. There were take away food shops everywhere, obviously the need for food goes hand in hand with drugs. We did indulge in a slice of take away pizza.