Flights of Eagles

June 16-17

Sunday we had arranged to meet at the Arends Nest, a popular spot on the northwestern end of the Herengracht.

Amsterdam Centrum, the old city, is largely defined by several concentric canals, sort of like those concentric ridges in the earth works at Poverty Point. Maybe the Dutch of the Golden Age were descended from the mound builders.

These concentric canals are crossed by several others, so the old city is a warren of canals, alleys, narrow streets, drugs, sex, beer, museums, and cheap souvenirs. In other words, it’s the kind of place that everybody wants to visit.

My hotel is on one of the canals, the Prinsengracht, but some distance away from the Dam and the wilder part of the old town. I’m near the eastern end of the canal, but it’s a short walk to the Prinsengracht station for the No. 12 tram. I took that five stops to Nieuwezijds Kolk. 

I looked that up. It means something like “New Side’s Eddy” or maybe “Pond.”

The street it’s on is Nieuwezijds Voorburgwaal, which Wikipedia translates as “New Side Front Bastion Wall.” It’s the site of an old defensive wall of the city. 

The street is home to the royal palace and the New Church. My last time in Amsterdam, there was a coronation in those buildings. 

Old Sides is the east side of old town. There’s an Oudezijdz Voorburgwaal, which runs through the Red Light District.

I had been to the bar, Arends Nest, before, but long enough ago that I have forgotten how to get there. I had copied Google instructions into my notebook and was able to follow them right to the place.

I came early to give me time to stroll around the neighborhood. 

Amsterdam is one of the most photogenic cities in the world. Riding a bike or walking, you look in any direction and see graceful proportions. The buildings, some of them 400 or 500 years old, are all made to complement each other.

Arends (or in English, Eagle’s) Nest is a bar specializing in Dutch craft beer. It has 52 on tap.

I couldn’t get through all 52, but did try a few. 

The bartender said one of the selections was a red IPA called If Glitter Was a Hop, brewed by Dutch Bargain in Groede. Red IPA? Say no more.

Stupid name, though.

It was a competent red IPA, which is to say it was very good. It had plenty of strong malt flavor, which is a result of the red part of the mix, and lots of hops, which is the IPA part.

It ran around 8 percent ABV. It not only had a stupid name, but also a stupid feature that I was lucky enough to avoid.

The brewer puts actual glitter into the beer. The bartender says it settles out, but when they put in a new keg, they turn it upside down and get cascades of glitter with the first pulls. 

The keg had been sitting for enough time to let the particles settle. I couldn’t see any junk in my drink.

I can’t imagine anything I want to do less than drink clutter in my beer. Natural sediment in unfiltered ale is fine. But please don’t feed me Mylar.

Another interesting take was a black IPA called Hedgehogs on the Horizon, from a brewery called Het Uiltje in Haarlem.

It was stout hopped like an IPA. Not unlike Guinness, there was a hint of unsweetened chocolate in the malt. The flavor was definitely dry, like Guinness. But not like Guinness it was fragrant and sharp from lots of bitter flowers.

It had an alcohol content of 5.5 percent and wasn’t a bad drink at all. The flavor is very distinct, though. I might try it again, but one in an evening’s enough.

We tried a couple of promising places for food, but the wait was an hour at one spot and unknown at the other, which was essentially a takeout place with a few seats. There was no waiting list. You had to compete for a seat.

We wound up at an undistinguished bar, where we had some nachos. That stood in as dinner for me.

Later, after strolling the Red Light District and the Dam, I made my way home on the No. 4 tram.

I stopped for a beer at Bouwman, on my corner. I saw someone who looked familiar and began to compliment her on her work ethic. 

Oops. This isn’t the lady who quite literally ran the whole operation Saturday night.

No, Harry. You were trying to be gracious. You weren’t really sure, were you? Why didn’t you ask?  You fuck-up. 

Lucky for me, it wasn’t too bad, after all. She said she was the lady’s sister and that people mistake them all the time. True? Fuck do I know, but I’ll accept it this time.

Monday I had no place special to go, so I took a tram ride, the No. 4 from Utrechtsestraat to the end of the line at AmstelStation. There’s not much out there, but that’s all right. 

I waited till the trolley started back the other way.

This is a great ride. It passes the Cuyp Market, Utrechsestraat, Rembrandtplein, the Flower Market.

There was nothing to interest me in the Central Station, so I got off before the end of the line, at the Rokin stop, not far from Dam Square

I walked through more of these beautiful streets and alleys before I took the tram back to Utrechtsestraat. 

I met Larry at Ooievaar around 5. We had a quick beer and then went to Cuyp Market.

We stopped at the coffeeshop, Katsu, in the market area, where I had a little cake and coffee. 

We reached De Pizzabakkers at a good time. It was fairly empty. This is the place we tried on Sunday. What a difference a day makes.

I opted for a pizza they call Da Noi. It’s a cheesy Margherita with sausage. Fantastic.

Pizzabakers even had Montepulciano d’Abruzzo on the menu. Of all the different types of wine, that may be my favorite variety in all the world. Power of suggestion or not—I don’t care—but this was up there with the best Abruzzos I’ve had.

When we walked back through Cuyp Market Street the stalls were closed, and loose trash covered the street waiting for cleanup.

Some of the birds had already volunteered to help.

We also stopped at some point during our wandering in an upscale coffee shop on Utrechtsestraat. This is the boutique street, remember, so with this kind of business you want to prove that you can be a good neighbor.

No loud music here. The men at the counter wear bowties. The store keeps a man outside who dresses like a butler. He chats with people and keeps the sidewalk clean.

I bought a boxed spacecake, which came in a nifty little shopping bag that read “Happiness From Amsterdam.”

After a few beers more and that spacecake, I slept the sleep of the lost.

We had planned to take the train to Haarlem the next morning, but when I woke up around 7 on Tuesday, I knew I wasn’t going anywhere. Except back to bed.

It took a while, but I managed to get an e-mail off to Larry. I didn’t want him to get onto the 11 o’clock train thinking I was there too.

I stayed in bed till 11, then went up the street for some eggs and toast, and most important, coffee.

I stayed in till five or so and then walked carefully down to the Cuyp Market to meet Larry for dinner. He had recommended Bazar, a Turkish restaurant in a former synagogue on the Cuyp Market Street.

The menu is long and varied. Larry pointed out the veal spare-ribs, so—knowing that you follow Larry to a restaurant anywhere—I chose to have that.

They were reasonably meaty, and came with pickled vegetable salad, which was marginal, and some fries, which were OK.

The meat, though, was superb—tender and moist, savory and rich. I had a couple of glasses of a pretty good sauvignon blanc. I tried a merlot too but that was disappointing.

We went around the corner to Katsu for dessert, a little cake and espresso.

I capped that with a couple of beers at Ooievaar and Bouwman before I came back to call it a night.

I’m having another great time, gang.

Here’s to great times, and good dreams.

Harry

Great Gouda and Better Beer

June 15

My first task of the day on Saturday was to take a short stroll to Utrechtsestraat and find a cheese shop called Tromp. 

But I came across the photo of the day first. I think it’s a houseboat designed by Jules Verne. It’s tied up about a block from the hotel.

I needed to get a block of aged Gouda for dessert after dinner.

I got it on two tries. I walked past the shop the first time because I was looking at the awnings and hanging signs on storefronts for the name. “Tromp” runs vertically in pale white up the side of the front window. 

So the next time you want great cheese, you can look for that.

The place was piled high with I can’t guess how many varieties of Dutch cheese. 

The cheese plate at Brouwerij Poesiat en Kater had some aged Gouda on it. I had tasted Gouda before, but nothing like that. It was as good as any aged English Cheddar.

So I was on the hunt for aged raw-milk Gouda. Tromp had two to offer. The man offered me cubes of each one. I opted for the cow’s milk, but the goat’s milk Gouda was just as good. Bother were even better than the stuff I ate at the brewery.  

From there I walked a short stretch to meet the No. 14 tram at Rembrandtplein. I had to recharge my chip card and that was a mild adventure. 

It took my a couple of tries before I managed to guess that the card doesn’t slip into a slot, but lies flat on the surface of a small recess. I selected English for the transaction, but each time the screen changed, it went back to Dutch, and of course it’s a touch screen, not a keyboard, so it doesn’t always work. 

I started to figure it out after my first transaction ended in failure.

The second time I did all right until the machine asked me if I wanted “een bon.” A man was trying to help, but he knew about as much Dutch as I do. 

I had no idea what this thing was trying to sell me. So I chose “nee.” That much Dutch I know.

I must have waited too long, because the transaction was called off and I had to start again.

This time, the instructions came up in English all the way through. When the Dutch offer een bon, just say “ja.” It’s a receipt.

I was going to meet Larry at Brouwerij ’t IJ, a landmark bar in a windmill near the body of water known as the IJ. Dutch spelling treats the combination of “i” and
“j” as a single letter in itself. To my ear, it sounds identical to English “eye.” Or “I.” Or “Aye.”

On the tram, stops are posted on a screen as they come up. 

But Pontanusstraat, the station for ’t IJ brewery, is announced. Before it gives the official name of the station, the recording first identifies the stop in English as “the Windmill.” I gather it’s the only windmill actually in the city of Amsterdam.

The place was jammed, as usual, but we managed to find open seats at the bar. We ordered the IPA.

Next to us was a man with curtly white hair and a pair of forearm crutches. He asked what we were having. We told him, and warned him that it’s strong, bitter, and very tasty.

So he ordered one. He said he liked it.

When he had finished it, though, he decided to leave after one. He said it was strong enough that it was having an effect on him and he didn’t want to get drunk.

Most of the ales brewed by the company are excellent. The IPA is right up there. The only disappointment has been a session IPA, which I tried at another bar and found to be a little watery.

We left the windmill, crossed Oosterburggracht, and walked along it toward Larry’s place.

On the way we passed Frank’s Smoke House, where the cannabis fumes were floating out of the open door. In the doorway, just entering the place, was a man with curly white hair on two forearm crutches. 

Maybe he was going for the coffee.

(Editor’s note: Harry was mistaken about the nature of the Smoke House. Whatever the aroma was, it wasn’t cannabis. Frank’s Smoke Shop serves smoked meats.)

Larry is renting a small apartment from a friend who is out of town. It is unusual because even though it is essentially one room, it has a kitchen, with a refrigerator, a small stove, and even an oven.

Dinner was fun. We started with marinated mushrooms and some Moroccan whole wheat bread, which was leavened, and not pita. 

He had cooked up some merguez sausages and a sauce made with tomato paste and lentils that he mixed with orecchiette. All very good.

So was the red wine. But I forget what it was.

We had the Gouda for dessert with more of the Moroccan bread.

On the way back to the station, we found the Windmill closed so we went into the bar next door, the Langendijk, which promises “kick-ass beers.”

We tried a couple of short ones as a test and agreed they were pretty kick-ass.

At the end of the tram ride, I wasn’t ready to call it quits. I stopped at Bouwman, a bar on the corner of Prinsengracht and Utrechtsestraat.

This was Saturday night and the tables on the sidewalk were packed. The barroom not so much. One woman was running the whole place by herself. She was in the back; she was tossing burgers onto the griddle. She was pouring, delivering, stepping into the cellar to fetch stuff.

Smiling the whole time, too.

I stayed for three beers. It should have been two, but she served my second, which tasted remarkably good, but also remarkably like my first, a Vedett IPA. I asked, is this the De Koninck? 

It was fine with me, but she not only apologized; she drew me a De Koninck too.

Did I say before that I love this town?

Stay well, all. And don’t forget to say “cheese.” It exercises the smile muscles.

Harry 

Other Places, Other Times

June 13-14

Thursday I made it a point to break a pattern. 

I spent a couple of hours in the Rijksmuseum. That much isn’t a pattern, but a must. You have to go there at least once any time you’re in Amsterdam.

Usually, though, I never get past the Dutch Masters. That’s what the place is really known for, after all, and the Vermeers and the Rembrandts alone are enough to keep me happy. 

So I’m usually worn out by the time I’ve crept through those rooms. This time I had a new strategy to give equal time to neglected centuries. 

I’ll be in town for another week. I didn’t even try to see “The Night Watch” or “The Milkmaid.” I’ll get to them next time.

It’s easy to get to the museum from the Hotel Prinsengracht: turn right as you go out, walk a couple of hundred yards to the first canal that goes to the left. That’s Spiegelgracht.

You can see the Rijksmuseum from that intersection. Now, I got lost once in Amsterdam during a walk that was just as simple. But that time, I had been eating space cake with a few pints of ale. This time I was sober, and so made it just fine.

The visit started on the lower floor, with the medieval collection. 

Medieval art is generally regarded as stiff and definitely a product of its time. That’s much of the attraction. It invites you to imagine the hands that created these works so long ago. 

Wooden apostles, crucifixes, a gleaming golden bust that once held a bit of a saint’s skull—even when they are out of context like this, in glass cases, they conjure a different state of mind. Don’t get me wrong. I wouldn’t want to go there, but it’s kind of fun to visit in the imagination.

The museum also has a number of the brightly colored scenes of happy village life, guys bringing in the sheaves, toppling barmaids, and getting drunk. They aren’t Breughels, but they’re in the same vein. Sort of like Amsterdam today.

One of the most fascinating artifacts is a rosary bead. It opens up to show a crowd scene of the crucifixion, carved in miniature detail inside a space no bigger than an apricot. Who carved that? Who made the tools?

I didn’t get a shot of the bead, but managed to photograph a slightly larger carved group, which I believe portrays the death (or Dormition) of the Virgin Mary. The detail is fascinating.

There was also a presentation case of packaging designed for opium. The Dutch government took over the opium trade in its East Indian colonies late in the 19th century.

The second floor has 19th century work. Many are by painters showing the influence of Gauguin and Van Gogh.

It’s very difficult to bring variety into Dutch landscapes. You can add or subtract a windmill. But everything is so flat that the compositions all look much the same. 

One, however, shows a tree with an almost shellburst pattern of branches bending over a stream. Lost in the shade is a painter working in a rowboat. There is a flat landscape in the background, but the radiating branches of the tree reduce it to bright glimpses through the dark leaves.

Larry and I were to meet at 6 at Wynand Fockink in Pijlsteeg, an alley near Dam Square. Wynand (sometimes spelled Wijnand) Fockink started a distillery here in the 17th century. The bar is a tasting room for the company’s products, mostly jenever.

My favorite is Bierbloem. I’m not sure of the spelling, but know from experience that it’s a sweet liqueur made from ale. We got shots of that and chasers of Rijk, the beer it’s made from.

One bar isn’t enough, so we proceeded to Bar Jones in another alley called De Nes.

We worked our way a little farther down De Nes to a brew pub, Bierfabriek, where we had a red ale called Rosso, which was pretty good though a little light, and roast chicken, which was one of the tastiest meals I’ve had in Amsterdam.

Friday I worked on a recap of my first few days in town. Then I needed a nap.

Larry told me about another brew pub, Brouwerij Poesiat & Kater, about 3 or 4 km from the Prinsengracht Hotel. After the surprisingly good dinner at Bierfabriek, we decided to try the food there.

First Larry biked to the hotel and handed me a transport card, good for tram, bus, metro. Very handy, just tap the sensor on the way in and the way out.

Bikes have become a bit of a challenge for me lately, so I’m on foot or on public transport. 

Larry walked his bike to the Albert Cuyp Market, which is not too far from the hotel. It’s in the Pijp, a district just outside the old town, which is known as Centrum.

The Cuyp Market is a regular gathering place in Amsterdam. It’s an every day street fair with pavilions set up to sell food, clothes, gadgets, you guess it. Years ago, on my first trip to the city, it’s where I bought small clip-on lamps for my bicycle.

You can get a ticket here for riding at night without lights. They are not standard issue when you rent a bike.

This time I didn’t need lamps, but could use a little sugar. I bought a stroopwafel, a sandwich of two flat waffles with syrup in between. It was like eating a large, sticky cookie.

We took a break at Katsu, a coffee shop near the market, where Larry had a little smoke and I had coffee. Then we moved on to the tram stop. 

Larry took off on his bike to meet me at the other end of the ride.

I was OK with the ticket, but this was the first time I had to enter one of these trams on my own. The other times, I was following people who had done this before.

I tipped the ticket against the sensor. There was a beep to acknowledge that, but the gate didn’t swing open. So I pushed against it. No good.

A lady who was quicker than I was showed me that the gate opens the other way. Of course, it should. It isn’t going to swing into the car where people are standing.

I apologized for being stupid and went to another part of the car. 

I hadn’t had anything stronger than espresso all day but even so it felt like lala land in my head. Maybe I’d caught a contact high at Katsu.

There was even similar fun on the way out. I remembered the card and got a double beep this time. The gate was no problem because I was headed in its direction. 

But the doors didn’t open. Larry was grinning on the other side. I’m looking for the door button. There’s nothing on the door at all.

Larry hits the button on the outside to let me out before the car pulls away.

Later, on the way home, I was watching closely. That small green button on the handrail isn’t to request a stop. It’s the door switch.

I suddenly felt almost competent.

After our experience at Bierfabriek, we expected the food to be good at Poesiat & Kater.

We looked at the menu and found it limited. We didn’t want chicken again and didn’t feel like buying $30 steaks. I ordered a cheese platter to start. It had four kinds of cheese, including a tiny wedge of Camembert and three or four small sticks of Gouda. 

Not much for 16 euros.

The beer was better. The company brews a variety under two names, Poesiat en Kater and Van Vollenhoven. I tried three of the Van Vollenhovens.

One was called East Indies Pale Ale. There was another called Falcon Ale, which was a bit too sweet. Princesse Bier was good. 

To my taste the East Indies was the best of the trio. It was fragrant, well hopped, and balanced by plenty of malt.

It had been another gray day, but we got a break in the clouds, so it was fun to sit at a picnic table outside and watch the gulls fly by.

Larry was put off by the cheese plate, so we moved to Dimitri’s, which is across the street from the tram station. Larry had a variety of appetizers for dinner. 

There was a dish of mild roasted chiles. He also had local favorite called bitterballen, a kind of croquette served with sauce.

I tried one. The sauce was interesting. It was pale green. Maybe this is what curried guacamole might taste like.

We were in a place called Muiderpoort. A conventional rail station and stops for several tram lines are packed within a couple of blocks.

The No. 1 tram comes closest to the hotel so I took it back to Vijzelgracht station. 

I stopped at a bar on the corner of Prinsengracht for a glass of Affligem, an ale made by a Belgian brewing company that claims to date back to 1079.

I’ve had it before, and it’s a good Belgian ale. It has some flavor of herbs. I never know if it’s stuff added or a natural flavor in the hops or the malt, but it’s characteristic of Belgian brews.

So having done my bit to support the brewing industry, I headed toward home base and a night’s rest.

Good rest and fine herbs, gang. Everybody stay well.

Harry

A Long Haul Worth the Effort

June 10-12

I’m back in the land of ale and cake.

This is one of the beautiful cities of the world. Its ancient leaning houses, its canals lined with houseboats, its memories of the Golden Age and the tulip bubble—Amsterdam’s a great city just to sit and watch.

And traveling to Amsterdam can be fraught with surprises. I’ve been here a few times and so far there has been at least one surprise on the way here or on the way home.

My first trip, on Virgin Atlantic, left Newark six hours late because one of the engines needed a critical part that had to be taken from the engine of another plane that was sitting at JFK. 

The second trip was delayed when the auxiliary power system failed during the taxi to the runway.

The time Joanna and I went together, we flew on British Airways and missed our connections in London on the way home.

BA may never have expected us to make the connection, which had a window of less than one hour. It usually takes half an hour just to get people off a plane once it reaches the gate.

My boarding pass for the second flight didn’t even have a seat assignment. 

The current trip started Monday night. It had been drizzling quietly all day. 

The plane arrived about an hour late and then lost more time because the airport was running late and planes were backed up.

Later, the flight captain explained that  thunderstorms had delayed numerous flights “from the East Coast.” 

All the East Coast? Part of it? A little bit of it? He didn’t say so I don’t know.

I booked an Aer Lingus flight through Expedia. It seems that, wherever you’re going, Expedia can usually get you from here to there. But first you have to go somewhere else.

My flight was going by way of Dublin. The connection was long gone by the time we touched down.

So were all the seats on direct flights. So I had to go by way of Heathrow and change yet again.

I’m taking comfort in the knowledge that there’s a comical consistency about all this.

Of course, I wasn’t alone.

There was quite a line to arrange new flights at Dublin. So I got into a long discussion with George, a Canadian on his way to Hamburg with his family.

George is interested in history. He finds U.S. history (which he calls “American”) more engaging than Canadian. 

I think it’s because the Canadians get along so much better than we do in the States. It’s a propensity for violent disagreement that makes interesting history.

He pointed out that the U.S. can thank Canadians for the White House. It was painted white after Canadians burned it during the War of 1812.

Heathrow followed the universal custom of keeping arrival and departure gates as far apart as humanly possible. On the bus from Terminal 2 to Terminal 5 a man and his wife asked me if I had come from Newark.

They had, too. And they were taking the same roundabout route to Amsterdam.

The trip to Terminal 5 wasn’t a complete nuisance. T5 is where Huxley’s is. It’s a bar with several good taps. I was going to opt for Fuller’s London Pride but then noticed something new to me, Camden Pride pale ale.

It was sharply hopped, giving it a crisp edge. But it was light on malt so there wasn’t much beyond that crispness.

At the gate, a man named Simon saw the chain on my vest and asked about my watch.

I told him in brief the story of Luzern and the street with four places named “Harry’s” and not one of them a bar. 

It turns out he was interested because his grandfather was a successful watchmaker. Apparently successful enough to establish the family’s fortune.

Simon said he comes from the Midwest but lives in Hawaii now. I guess that’s fortune indeed, if you like beaches.

I fell asleep during the short jaunt to Amsterdam. I know this only because the touchdown woke me up. 

We got in around 5 p.m. local time, so I had been traveling through and between airports for more than 20 hours. A direct flight from Newark to Hong Kong takes less time than that.

I may have managed a couple of hours of sleep over the Atlantic on Monday night—or more accurately, Tuesday morning. But I had been pretty much awake the whole time since 7 a.m. Monday.

Schiphol was fairly efficient. The train ride to Central Station is always quick. Trains run on time every dozen minutes or so.

A cab took me some roundabout way to the Hotel Prinsengracht. 

Somewhere during that leg of the trip, I caught a second wind.

Larry showed up around 6 or 7, and we started bar-hopping.

We stopped at Bush Docter, near Rembrandtplein, for space cake. Then we went to one of the great cafes on Utrechtsestraat for a beer. 

Not knowing the house rules, we sat outside with our beers while I started to eat half the cake. Eating the stuff is generally stronger than smoking it. So you start with half.

It takes about 20 minutes or more for the cake to release the drug into the system. It was about 8 p.m., and so far north, it was still broad daylight. The white half moon on the blue was so beautiful. 

Rapturously so. The cake was kicking in.

Utrechtsestraat is the high-rent district so most of the restaurants were damned expensive. We wound up at a reasonable Turkish place called Ali Ocakbasi.

There were roasted peppers, cubed eggplant in a delicate sauce, grilled lamb, couscous. 

Amsterdam’s not known for great food. Beer, yes, but not food. 

This was pretty good. For Amsterdam, I’d say it was spectacular. Of course, a little space cake and no food since breakfast pique the tastebuds.

After several more stops and some strong beers, we had to leave the Cafe Krom when it closed. At the corner of the Prinsengracht, Larry left in one direction to get his bike, and I made my way independently, if a little unsteadily, back to the hotel—a distance of a couple of hundred yards.

A man came up behind me and asked if I was OK. He may have seen me extend my hand toward a tree trunk to avoid walking into it.

I insisted that all was fine. He had no ulterior motive. He patted me on the shoulder and then moved on.

Larry told me later that, seeing the guy approach me, he changed direction in case I needed backup. The whole encounter lasted only seconds and ended without incident.

I got into bed around 2 and didn’t move till 11.

Wednesday Larry came over in the afternoon.

It was after 2 and I hadn’t eaten anything, so Larry and I took off to find lunch.

It had been variously drizzling and pouring. This time it was wet enough that my hat leaked.

First, we ducked into a Barney’s franchise on the Reguliersgracht for coffee and dry shelter. When the rain slacked off, we proceeded to Rembrandtplein, past the bronze figures based on “The Night Watch” to a dark restaurant called the Three Sisters. I had my first beer of the day and a grilled cheese sandwich with tomato.

I don’t know if sheer hunger was the cause, or if I was still enjoying a lingering buzz from last night’s space cake, but that sandwich, entirely undistinguished, was delicious.

We strolled back to the canal to visit Sir Michael. He has the entire third floor apartment in what looks to me like a Golden Age townhouse that overlooks the Prinsengracht.

We brought some beer for the fridge, but after last night, it was still too early for me to drink any. Larry and Sir Michael were smoking joints while we watched a classical music program.

There was a break in the rain, so Larry and I wandered around the neighborhood for a while. Later we went back to Sir Michael’s where Merle, who used to manage the Hemp Bar before it closed, had joined the group.

I tried one of the bottles of ale that I had brought earlier. It was called Vedett and it was very good.

The discussion touched on some colorful topics, ranging from religious conundrums to colonial influence on the practice of Shariah law.

We tried to go to a popular pizzeria for dinner. Sir Michael and Merle went ahead of us on bicycles to scout out the place. Larry and I were walking.

We rounded a corner to see Sir Michael pedaling in our direction, like the cavalry with a situation report. The place was mobbed and no one had any idea how long the wait would be.

Plan B quickly presented itself—cross the street to a burger joint called Geflipt. Better than bad, it was good. The meat, or maybe the bun, had an herbal flavor that I couldn’t identify. It was different, and interesting.

The ale had a great name “Mooie Nel.” The first word is pronounced almost like “moy” with a drawl. It means “pretty” or “attractive.”

This Nel wan’t only pretty, but a little sweet too. But not too sweet

After dinner we retraced our route up Utrechtsestraat to a great cafe called Onder de Ooievaar. I don’t know how that’s pronounced. (I should have asked Merle.) It means “under the stork.” 

I’ve read somewhere that storks used to nest on the chimneys of Amsterdam. Maybe the name refers to that.

I had a few more beers, including a Le Chouffe and a strong ale called Zatte from Brouwerij ’t Ij, but nowhere near the excess of the night before. 

I was feeling good, though, and sacked out around the same time.

Sleep tight, and mooie dreams to all.

Harry