Amsterdam: day 2.

Day 2 in Amsterdam, and our first full day, was one that we all were really looking forward to! We let ourselves sleep in that morning, since we were still so jet-lagged from the night before, then headed back toward Central Station to find some breakfast. We ate at this cute little pancake place, and ordered Dutch pancakes, which are essentially just crepes, but a little thicker, and not quite as delicious (in my personal opinion). Mine was covered in chocolate though, so I was happy. We ordered Dutch pancakes, because of course we kind of had to, but I saw someone order American pancakes with chocolate on them, and I still dream about them. They just looked so fluffy and delicious, and I really wish we would have gone back for them haha.

But anyway, that's not what this post is about. After breakfast, we went and picked up our rental car! We got lucky and were upgraded to a car with gps, which was nice for me because I didn't have to navigate us the whole way to our destinations. Brandon drove us out through the countryside toward the tulip fields, but traffic was backed up seriously so bad, so we turned and went to the windmills first instead. I was really excited when I saw pictures of these windmills. In all the pictures I saw, there were like, three or four windmills, so you can imagine my surprise when we got there and saw all of them. It was so nice that day, so we spent quite a bit of time walking out to the windmills. There was a path that stretched pretty far, so we were able to see them up close, and get different views. It was perfect. I think they look so fake in the pictures!

After the windmills, we made our way back to the Keukenhof tulip gardens. We were there probably a week or two too soon, but most everything was in bloom inside the gardens, and it was beautiful! Just endless displays of different types of flowers (but mostly tulips), and so many colors!! Like the canals, I just kept wanting to take so many pictures! After we left the gardens, we stopped by the fields on our way out. I hadn't done my research properly, and was sad to find out that Keukenhof fields was not the place where we could rent bikes and ride them through the fields. But we stood there and took lots of pictures, so I was still pretty happy!

I have to put a quick plug in for Brandon here: he navigated the streets of Amsterdam like nobody's business. I mean, it helped that he had a big gps screen right in front of him, and that they drive on the same side of the road as we do here, but he still did a great job. And I'm grateful that he actually wanted to drive on this trip, because it helped us do and see a lot more things!

That night we found a cute little Italian restaurant for dinner, and it was probably the best Italian food I've ever had. Actually, tied for first with the Italian we had in Paris. But still, so good. Then we wandered through the fair that was situated right in the middle of Dam Square, and found some stroopwafels for dessert!