Well, maybe 2 hotels, but one was in Atlanta. We were bumped from the 1st Tucson to Atlanta flight. We got on the 2nd one, but the connection to the Atlanta-Amsterdam flight was a squeaker. The time got tighter when we arrived in Atlanta on time but couldn't get to the gate. The flight attendants even requested that people not block the aisles so that we could get out and make our connection, but no-o-o-o.
By the time we got to the gate, it was closed and the plane was gone. So we ended up spending the night in Atlanta. Trout thought that might actually be a good practice in the future if we can't fly non-stop from the west. But it resulted in emails to the owner of the apartment in Zandvoort and the car rental agency to let them know we would be late.
Of course, we didn't get any discounts for the missed day, but the apartment owner in Zandvoort totally understood. She works for KLM.
I didn't take many pictures of the interiors of the places we stayed. I probably should have. But I am providing links to them.
Zandvoort: Zonnengloed aan Zee. The apartment was within walking distance of the race track, but Trout drove over there partly because the parking was cheaper than feeding the meters in front of the apartment. There were virtually no free parking areas in the entire resort town!
This is the foggy view from our patio.
I was still quite cold and the grass was dead.
We faced the water which was to the west and I thought we wouldn't get to see a decent sunset.
I was wrong about that.
After Zandvoort, we took the long route up north, around some water and back down to Arnhem. I couldn't resist staying in this Jugendstil style hotel that is over 100 years old. One morning at breakfast, a tour guide came by with a group. The Hotel Molendal is beautiful with great service. My only complaint is that we requested a room on the 1st floor. That would be the 2nd floor for Americans, and we ended up on the 3rd (US) floor. The room was lovely and huge, but with those high ceilings, it was quite a climb.
This was our balcony.
We had a nice view from it, but the weather was too bad to make much use of it.
The next day we had breakfast, toured around a bit, came home, went into town for a good dinner and all was fine. But we thought he ate something that disagreed with him and he ended up with the gut issues. I went down for breakfast the following morning, brought something back up for him and we both stayed in the room all day. That meant we missed one of my main reasons for going to Arnhem.
We were supposed to leave the next day, but he was still so sick, that I cancelled our reservation for our next stop and got the hotel to allow us to keep the room because he was still too sick to drive and I couldn't drive the rental because we didn't pay for me to do so. I just kept feeding the parking meter out front. And I kept telling the hotel staff that we didn't need any cleaning, just fresh towels and empty the trash. They felt very badly about that.
I went down to breakfast that day and brought more up for him. He did eat a little and felt well enough to go out to dinner. That last night in Arnhem, we went to a very nice Italian place and he had some great tomato soup and plain pasta with oil and parmesan. They charged us for the child's pasta.
By this point I thought we might be having problems with the water. It was all perfectly safe, but you can have reactions just because it is different. So we stopped using the local water for anything but bathing, teeth-brushing and cooking for the rest of trip. I had no problems with making coffee and neither of us any other issues that we could blame on the water because we stuck with bottled beverages.
We drove from Arnhem to Bruges and checked into our apartment there, the Florent Family. It had 2 bedrooms, but we chose it because there was an elevator and no stairs to climb and it was reasonably priced. I used the 2nd bedroom with the bunk beds as a dressing room. There was pay parking out front, but we didn't use it except to check in and out. We parked for free about 2 blocks away on a main street right next to lots of businesses and the supermarket we used.
The location and apartment were great. The only real issue I had was that we were supposed to clean it at the end of our stay. Nowhere in any of the information on it or in my correspondence with the owner, did it mention that. We only learned that when we saw the rules in the apartment. Needless to say, I was a bit miffed, but we left that apartment cleaner than we found it.
I don't think the owners made a very thorough check of the place when people checked out. I turned on the oven to cook something and smoke started coming out. Apparently, some previous renters, who knows how long ago, cooked something in the grill pans in there. They didn't bother cleaning them at all, but you couldn't see that unless you removed them from the oven. I did my best to scrub those, too. There was a dishwasher, but a lot of that grease was baked on.
There were several little maintenance things that should have been kept up with and Trout actually did some of them for the owner. We did point out some of the problems the place had, but I got the feeling that he really didn't care.
On our first trip to the supermarket, I got tulips. They lasted the whole week. The apartment was well furnished with dishes, glasses, etc., but there was absolutely nothing to put flowers in. So I rigged up something that kind of worked.
Trout really liked this door down the street. Another sideways picture, sorry.
We walked through this medieval gate to and from the supermarket and our car.
We passed swans along the way.
Maybe I'll start anticipating this problem and turn these pictures wrong. That'll be for the next posting. This is the door to our B&B in Leiden, the Huys van Leyden. We had a fairly small room here, but it was very nice. It was on the ground floor and overlooked a courtyard, so it was very quiet and private. I had hoped we would get a room in front overlooking the canal, but that was also right on the street and right inside the front door so it would have been pretty noisy.
Now crank your head to the right to see this stairway to our Amsterdam apartment correctly. We stayed at the Amsterdam Fashion and Museum District Apartment. I have to say that this is the nicest apartment we have ever stayed in on any of our trips. When we got our car at the airport, we had to give a local address. I used this one and the agent asked me if I realized that it was on the most expensive street in Amsterdam. I did, but I told her it was also the best place we could find in the city at a reasonable rate. The closer you get to the train station, the more expensive things get and the more likely you are to have to climb even more stairs.
The owners had remodeled it themselves and lived in it while they were fixing up their own place which is on the top 2 floors above it. If you go to the link, you will see how cool it is. Turn your speakers off if you can't stand the annoying music.
The only criticism we had was that the door to the bathroom opened out into the hall and opposite to approaching it from the bedroom, and there was a step down right at the edge of the entrance to the bathroom. You had to be careful to pull the door open far enough to get around it without stumbling off that step. Both of us had near misses with that.The narrow and steep stairway was much easier to go up and down than I anticipated. It went to a very small landing with 2 doors. Ours open straight into the apartment. The owners' opened into a little area at the bottom of their 1st staircase.
This is the street entrance. That shade of blue in the awning may be familiar to some of you.
Yeah, we were right above Tiffany's.
There was a large balcony off the back of the bedroom and kitchen. Even the last week of April, not much was budded out or blooming yet. I loved this green space between the apartment buildings and I loved seeing all of them, too. This is somewhat high-end but city living in Europe.
Trout and I get really tickled at the people on Househunters International who move to Europe and want a rental right in the center of town, but with no noise and lots of privacy. Duh!!!
I'm not sure if this is an IKEA closet or not. The owners are Swedish. I had seen pictures of these before, but had never operated one. There's a little wand to pull or push the racks up and down.
We were there the last week before the monarchy changed hands. In fact, we left the day of the transfer of power. This men's store across the street featured military uniforms and big screen TVs with information on the monarchy. In case you missed it, you can go here for some basic news or Google it. King Willem-Alexander is the first king since 1890. The Netherlands had been ruled by queens since then. And, will be again because he has only daughters, and the eldest is first in line to the throne.
One morning Trout called me into the back of the apartment to see this bird. It's a parrot. There were more of them. Parrots in Amsterdam? We don't know if they came from the nearby Vogel Park or if they were someone's pets.
No, there's not one in here.
They just had to hide themselves in these trees. A week or so later and we wouldn't have been able to see them at all.
This is the store across the street again. They were getting set up for the festivities. Those are Dutch flags.
On April 30th, shops would be open, there would be no cars, music would be playing and people would be having a very good time.
These are typical street scenes on a regular day.
Oops, distracted by another bird in the back.
Some of our other neighbors on the street, all decked out in orange, the color of Dutch royalty.
The last morning we were there, the street was very quiet. These people were giving away free orange hats.
I hope that gives you a bit of insight to the kinds of accommodations we typically use on our trips and where we specifically stayed on this one.
