Moving forward with my
Christmas 2023 solo travel, my next destination was the daring and turbulent
city of Amsterdam. Despite the anticipated absence of tulips and the sun, I still had my hopes up because quite frankly, I have heard a lot of nice things about this
city. Honest to goodness, it delivered the goods. My only regret was over-tightening it out on the accommodation budget side directly exposing
me AMS’ dirty laundry I hoped I never found out. Sleeping in a filthy
overpopulated hostel room was not an ideal way to spend such wonderful holidays. In a nutshell, I made a careless choice and paid a hefty
price. Other than that, the rest of it all was no less than amazing, at least at
the surface level (for now). I spent most of my time walking around and along most of the busy
canals from the Prinsengracht & Herengracht to the famously sin scenic district aka Red Light and occasionally sitting intently on coffee shops and bars for beers and beyond. Honestly, I was not able to fully maximize the trip due to poor planning OR the
lack thereof, hopelessly and miserably failing to book in advance the Rijksmuseum,
Anne Frank’s House, and even the van Gogh’s museum (with limited edition
pokemon features at that time). So that’s
pretty much how my first ever Amsterdam went – not very bad, but definitely an unfinished business warranting
a better-planned follow-up visit next time.
