day 7 - muiden

In the morning, all of us kids pounded some breakfast & coffee, then walked North to Central Station to grab a train to Muiden. Well, we made it most of the way there, then we tried to get a bus, but no luck with a bus strike going on; a bike, but no luck with the bike place closed; so we saddled Kora up on my back and walked 3+K into Muiden to check out the castle there. The town itself is extremely non-touristy; nothing in English, and few accommodations for Americans; appropriately, we loved it.

The castle was great - compact, clean, interesting, insanely photogenic, and even good for dragging K to.


We debated hitching a boat ride back to Amsterdam or a bike ride at least back to the train station, but we sucked it up and hit the road by foot again. We all got back together in the evening, had some dinner, and then Aaron and I hit the town again for a bit - this time sitting outside in a square South West of here, drinking Duvel and watching everyone walk past.

I did a quick photo project and stealth-ily shot a slow shutter speed shot of every group or individual that walked past. Fashion girl Heidi will love the results. When we're in our neighborhood here, we're pretty much not feeling like tourists. We know our neighbors, we're polite, we've figured our the hierarchy for traffic (trains - cars - bikes - then people on the bottom). From our window perches with wine, we make fun of the red and yellow rental bikes that get nailed by their Dutch counterparts - trying to teach them a lesson about proper traffic etiquette, cringe at the loud, English rugby athletes (and occasionally throw ice cubes at them) and some of us really enjoy the endless stream of short-skirted, blond, Dutch bicyclists... We've found the local parks, bars, coffee shops, pancake houses, falafel places, and grocery stores. If we had a solid internet connection, I just might not come home...