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MORE PICTURES FROM AMSTERDAM
Here are some more pictures from our trip:
Now, granted, this picture was taken at the
castle, but it could have been taken anywhere
in Amsterdam (clearly with a less medieval
looking door). All of the downstairs doors have
stairs like this! Very steep, and sticking right out
into the middle of the sidewalk! Seriously. And
there are no rails or guards! You could seriously kill
yourself just walking down the sidewalk and
stepping right into one of these pits! Yikes! Yes,
you really do need to watch your step when
walking around town! Cars, bikes, trams... And
then the cobblestone with uneven surfaces and
the odd stone sticking up... Definitely good for
making sure you keep your wits about you!
Smarties come in hexagonal boxes!
And "Diet Coke" is "Coke Light". Cream comes in "butter cups" and sugar comes
in "sleeves". Once, I even got cream in a sleeve!
Whenever you are leaving a city, or a speed zone, or anything else, they post the same sign as
the entry (or starting) sign, only with a red strike through it. It's like, "Cancel Muiderberg",
"Cancel 30km speed limit", etc. etc. It's kind of cute!
Bikes. Absolutely everywhere! This particular picture is just a small section of a commuter bike
rack by the train station in Weesp, though the scene could be found anywhere. Hundreds and
hundreds of bikes! It made for a very nice atmosphere! Standing at a major intersection and
watching all of the traffic move was just beautiful - I was struck with the complexity of the
logistics of moving cars, trams, busses, bikes and people in a smooth fashion. I wish I'd got a
picture of this one intersection... There are separate traffic lights for cars, bikes and people.
There are small medians between every lane of traffic and separate pedestrian lights for each
segment of the road. Everything works together so well... :)
(beautiful night scene) (it's actually a restaurant, but it looks nice, eh?)
The hooks in use! The vast majority of the houses are
built very narrow because when they were being
built, there was a window tax, so building thin and up
was better than building wider. Then, the staircases in
the houses are very narrow and steep and spiral!!! So,
you can imagine, there's no way to take anything
large or heavy upstairs! Also, they don't have a lot of
basements because the ground is so damp, etc. So,
they built these "arms" with hooks out of the top of
each house. Then, when you have to move things
upstairs, you throw ropes on the hook and pull the
object up. Now, imagine hulling a big heavy couch up
the side of a straight house - it would bang the whole
way up! So, all of the houses are actually slanted
outward so that the item doesn't bang against the
house! To top it all off, because the foundations are
often soft, many houses are slanting sideways and
are actually leaning on each other. So, you'd think it's
just an optical illusion, but there are actually rows of
houses leaning both sideways and forward! It is a
pretty neat effect!!!
Here are some more pictures from our trip:
Now, granted, this picture was taken at the
castle, but it could have been taken anywhere
in Amsterdam (clearly with a less medieval
looking door). All of the downstairs doors have
stairs like this! Very steep, and sticking right out
into the middle of the sidewalk! Seriously. And
there are no rails or guards! You could seriously kill
yourself just walking down the sidewalk and
stepping right into one of these pits! Yikes! Yes,
you really do need to watch your step when
walking around town! Cars, bikes, trams... And
then the cobblestone with uneven surfaces and
the odd stone sticking up... Definitely good for
making sure you keep your wits about you!
Smarties come in hexagonal boxes!
And "Diet Coke" is "Coke Light". Cream comes in "butter cups" and sugar comes
in "sleeves". Once, I even got cream in a sleeve!
Whenever you are leaving a city, or a speed zone, or anything else, they post the same sign as
the entry (or starting) sign, only with a red strike through it. It's like, "Cancel Muiderberg",
"Cancel 30km speed limit", etc. etc. It's kind of cute!
Bikes. Absolutely everywhere! This particular picture is just a small section of a commuter bike
rack by the train station in Weesp, though the scene could be found anywhere. Hundreds and
hundreds of bikes! It made for a very nice atmosphere! Standing at a major intersection and
watching all of the traffic move was just beautiful - I was struck with the complexity of the
logistics of moving cars, trams, busses, bikes and people in a smooth fashion. I wish I'd got a
picture of this one intersection... There are separate traffic lights for cars, bikes and people.
There are small medians between every lane of traffic and separate pedestrian lights for each
segment of the road. Everything works together so well... :)
(beautiful night scene) (it's actually a restaurant, but it looks nice, eh?)
The hooks in use! The vast majority of the houses are
built very narrow because when they were being
built, there was a window tax, so building thin and up
was better than building wider. Then, the staircases in
the houses are very narrow and steep and spiral!!! So,
you can imagine, there's no way to take anything
large or heavy upstairs! Also, they don't have a lot of
basements because the ground is so damp, etc. So,
they built these "arms" with hooks out of the top of
each house. Then, when you have to move things
upstairs, you throw ropes on the hook and pull the
object up. Now, imagine hulling a big heavy couch up
the side of a straight house - it would bang the whole
way up! So, all of the houses are actually slanted
outward so that the item doesn't bang against the
house! To top it all off, because the foundations are
often soft, many houses are slanting sideways and
are actually leaning on each other. So, you'd think it's
just an optical illusion, but there are actually rows of
houses leaning both sideways and forward! It is a
pretty neat effect!!!
