Hello! So it was my 28th birthday at the end of January, my other half and I had originally planned a couple of days in Brighton but after pricing up hotels, parking etc it started to look kind of expensive. Out of curiosity I priced up a trip to Amsterdam instead and it worked out around the same price! Last minute quick trip to Amsterdam it was then! π I fell in love with Amsterdam last year when we went for my birthday and felt like Amsterdam and I had unfinished business! π
Here is a link to my Amsterdam blog post from last year!
We left early hours on my birthday, I think we left at 02:30am for our 6:30am flight due to threats of snow throughout the night and my panicking mostly. The roads were all clear and by the time we got through security we managed to sneak in a quick Spoons breakfast before we were off!

We were very lucky that our flight wasn’t delayed and we were in Amsterdam just after 9am their time! We popped to our hotel to see if we could leave our bags with them for the day as our check-in time wasn’t until the afternoon but when we got there they said they had a room available so we could check in early and they had upgraded us to a canal view room! Lovely! I like being 28 already!

We hopped on a tram and visited The Moco Museum.





The artwork in there is predominantly Banksy, Roy Lichtenstein and Daniel Arsham. The museum is set out really well, we had one of those typical touristy voice thingys that tells you all about the art as you walk around. The Roy Lichtenstein room was so strange, like stepping into a painting..Which I guess is the idea! π
We got a tram back to the center and went to Body Worlds Museum but they were closed for an event so we had a walk around the shops (basically what I mean is I had a walk around Primark) …Honestly the biggest Primark I’ve ever seen! Then stopped for cake and a drink in a cafe then headed back to the hotel to get changed. We googled for ages somewhere to go and eat but being veggie is so awkward when you don’t know the places so we ended back at the Hard Rock, same place as last year… The Nachos and Cocktails are π!



As we stepped out of Hard Rock it was chucking it down with rain, we caught a tram to the centre again and had a stroll around getting absolutely drenched, it even snowed for a bit too which was very pretty! We walked down the red light district but then decided to head back to the hotel, tiredness of my early morning panicking had kicked in. We stopped at a supermarket on the way for supplies.. Chocolate and drink! We crashed out on the bed eating an amaaaazing chocolate bar and were asleep in no time!

We were up bright and early, checked out of our hotel and caught the tram through a frosty Amsterdam to the train station to leave our bags in the lockers, although it would’ve been cheaper to leave them at the Hotel or an independent storage shop those couple of euros more to have a bit more time exploring Amsterdam were worth it as we didn’t have to go back anywhere else before getting the train back to the airport.

We caught the little ferry across to the Amsterdam Lookout, we had booked the Lookout swing, can I just mention, one time my partner and I went on the London Eye (for my birthday) and he sat in the middle freaking out the whole time, yet here we were about to swing over the edge of an exceptionally tall building (for my birthday) .. Get yourself a ‘Dr Robotnik’ everybody! π

When we got to the top it was so icy, I was in full penguin waddle mode much to my partners amusement, a few heart skipping slips and near misses I had made it to the edge and the safety of a barrier to hold me up! What a beautiful view, the sky was so clear and Amsterdam was so pretty from way up there, I mean it’s pretty from way down there too but wow! I always find when you’re high up looking over places you suddenly feel teeny tiny, it’s strange to be able to see so much all at once, I look at every tiny building that makes the place you’re looking at, every little car and wonder where it’s going, all the tiny people moving around with a purpose, a place to be. So many different lives happening all at once, every single one completely different from the next. I would have stood there all day if it wasn’t for Dr Robotbik asking if we could go to the inside Lookout area as he was cold! π They had a lovely little bar that you could walk around and take in the view minus the freezing cold temperatures and scarily slippy floor so we took in the sights in there until it was our time slot for the swing! We only had to wait around 5/10 minutes, we were the first people of the day, as we walked out of the top again the clouds had suddenly come in and what had been the clearest most beautiful sky turned into just fog, wonderful timing! π We got strapped into the swing, lifted up and over the building as it started to swing us over what was supposed to be an incredible view but in fact was just a blurry fog, Dr Robotbik was secretly relieved! π Still such a cool experience!





This tickles me, these pictures the Lookout take are supposed to amazing, that white blur that we’re swinging over is Amsterdam, the exact view we had! π
We headed back to the Centre to go and give Body Worlds Museum another try, it was open! Yay! You start from the top floor and work your way down through the rooms, I was starting to think I had made a big mistake, I’m a very squeamish person and I can’t even deal with talking about medical situations/ weird stuff our bodies do/ blood etc and there I was essentially surrounded by bodies/ heads/ body parts that had once been alive and belonging to a living breathing human. I did go light headed and woozy, who’s idea was this again? I whizzed round the top floor with my eyes glazed over and feigning interest then stood and waited for Dr Robotnik, the next floor I tried to pretend it wasn’t real, I did find so much of it really interesting and managed to shake the ‘holy crap, I’m going to pass out’ feeling. I thoroughly enjoyed it by the end and even managed to read about the process on how they preserve the bodies, it was so clever!

I specifically liked the section about happiness, mainly because it didn’t make me feel dizzy but also because it was super interesting… Apparently happiness is determined by 50% genetics, 40% stuff we control and 10% circumstances, which is pretty cool! Also United Kingdom is the 19th happiest country in the world, Norway being first.





Admittedly I don’t look very happy in this picture! π
We had our last walk around Amsterdam then our last coffee and cake, before heading back to the train station and airport. Our flight home was delayed 3 hours, but the wait wasn’t bad as we discovered McDonald’s in Holland has the best vegetarian chicken burgers! They’re so good that we triple checked that they were definitely not chicken! ππ
I now feel content that I’ve ticked off everything on my Amsterdam ‘to do’ list! πβ
Thank you so much for reading! If you’ve made it this far then π !
