Hotel Caruso Haarlem

... and charged big bucks<br>for the service. I guess if you're buried in a church, you get an<br>express bus to heaven.<br><br>Also went walking along the canals. Lots of boats. Lots and lots of<br>bikes - bikes everywhere. They're all loaded down with baskets and kids<br>- I even saw a lady carrying a big floor lamp - the 5-foot tall kind-<br>on her bike.<br><br><br><br>

... to a nearby outdooor cafe. They had something on the menu called "English Breakfast". 2 Eggs 2 (Yes 2!!!) types of meatand toast - I gues the Dutch don't know about hash browns. Did I mention 2 types of meat? Bacon and some very, very yummy sausages. Judy got the same with Heidi and Don ordering the 'small' breafast consisting of a croissant and not much else. How sad. Of course, when breakfast comes both of them assume the English breakfast was for 2 ...

... Rijksmusuem (definitely the best museum we saw in amsterdam - lots of work by famous artists) * Torture Museum (a pretty overpriced, overated display showing punishments &amp; tortures from the past, incl the guillotine, etc) * Anne Frank's House (well actually the building where they were hidden away during WWII. It was really eerie to be in the exact rooms!) * The opening night of an annua contemporary dance festival called ...

... They had a huge cannon, many decadently decorated weapons (swords, spears, muskets, ect), amazing silver smith creations, and a large amount of other Dutch art. Oh yeah, it was cold as hell and snowing for a good part of the day too...blah. I wandered more of the city yesterday, and attempted to take some pictures of the red light district, but it was raining too hard. Gah. My roommates for the second night were; 2 from India, 1 from Canada, and 2 from Washington state! Crazy.

... first leg of our trip. Note for anyone who travels here, service in restaurants is alot different. Unlike in the US, where your server is at your table as soon as you walk in and giving you your check often before you finish eating/drinking. In Belgium and the Netherlands, service is much slower--there is no rush to hurry up and free up a table. Take as long as you want. It takes some time getting used to since we're pretty heavily conditioned....

... up in the sticks, where they had a farm with their own fishponds. Once again I was made to feel so welcome, they cooked a heap of different meats and fish which was unreal! It surprised me that people who have had fishponds for 15 years or so really had no idea how to fish with handlines or rod. They use a scoopnet and feed the fish bread and cathc them like that! but they prefer to eat them not catch them, it was such a peaceful day. One ...

... around the Red-light district. He informed us that actually only 2% of the women working as prostitutes were actually Dutch and were there of their own free will. The other 98% were generally from Eastern European countries where men had come and promised them an amazing life in Amsterdam, taken the girls, usually raped them numerous times to get them used to sex, got them addicted to drugs in most cases so they could become reliant on the income and pimp and ...

... is a word we throw around a lot without giving it much thought. As a general rule, the price you pay for freedom shouldn't include being denied freedom. Because Alli had just finished her fourth glass of absinthe, she turned to me and said she had to get out of the bar. We bid farewell to the bartender and our law school friend, and began to walk home. Marijuana makes you think about things in a different light, and on the walk home we discussed many things. We talked about going ...

... and when you are in the top you can enjoy of a amazing sight of the town. The guided tour takes 2 hours, so it's 4.00 p.m and we're starved so we go to a snack-bar and have a bagel and a greasy fried mozzarella stick (unhealthy meal; kids, don't do this at home!). Then we burn calories doing tourism along the town. All the ways go to Grote Markt, the central square of Haarlem; big and wondeful with ...

... over yet and there is plenty of competition at street level. Our next stop was at a place called Cruquius a few kilometres south on one of the canals that criss crossed the region. We were to visit a pump but this was no ordinary pump. It was an immense steam engine that drove a series of pistons that drew water out of the land on the lower side of the dyke and sent it into the canals on the upper side. There used to be several of these pumps in this area which ...