Spill the Wine (Amsterdam - final)

This is my final post for this Odyssey, dear reader. As such, there may be photos dropped in from anywhere on the trip.

As Sunday clawed its way into the conscious of Amsterdammers, the street cleaners were once again hard at work. The piles of detritus on a Sunday morning were larger than those from yesterday. It also appeared that some sort of bike-hating monster had ranged the streets, pushing bikes over and stacking them in doorways to stop people leaving their apartments.

The off-limits rotunda in Vondelpark

Amsterdam is not pretty in the early morning, dear reader. The fact that streets are so dirty is probably the only aspect of the city that we dislike. And so, to breakfast. Today we found a café up near the flower market. Once again the coffee was very good. I don't get what was going on with the coffee in Hungary, Austria and Germany. Lift your game. Today's food fare was toasties - an Americano for me (bacon, tomato and cheese - not sure why this is American but anyway) and a Hawaiian for Jayne (ham, cheese and pineapple) which she requested, without the Hawaiian component, eliciting a second look and a slight smirk from the server and a shake of the head from me. 

We briefly entertained the thought of sending some tulip bulbs home to the (current) favourite child who lives in the Southern Highlands. Only to be informed that export to Australia is not permitted. Indeed, the flower seller we spoke with said, "Absolutely not. I can send nothing to Australia". No Dutch tulips.

A photo without people in Vondelpark is not easy.

Sunday is a quiet day and many shops were not open. We walked around an area near the hotel where we had not previously been but there wasn't much to see. Aside from the Rijksmuseum and Rembrandt's House we have covered just about all the major attractions and it was a deliberate decision not to visit these two places.

In reality, we were just burning time until we met friends from home. They arrived yesterday to do the reverse of our trip, Amsterdam to Budapest, although with a different company. We had arranged to meet at Café Luxembourg for drinks at 4pm which was peak pedestrian time in the hospitality areas of Leidseplein and Spui. 

Flowers in Durnstein

As we wove our way towards our rendez-vous, a car pushed its way across the crowded footpath to try to enter the main street. There was oncoming traffic which included a tram. The driver astutely decided that the nose of his car was in danger so he did what any Amsterdammer would do; without any indication, he put his car into reverse and started to retreat onto the footpath he had just crossed, paying absolutely no attention to the fact that there were numerous pedestrians behind him, Jayne and me included. After the initial collision with my arm, a lightening fast assessment of the situation resulted in me drawing the attention of the driver to my presence by belting the back of his car. I also let him know bluntly, that I was not impressed with his cavalier disregard for pedestrians. As a memento of this encounter, I now sport a bruise on my arm and the driver is currently searching for a job involving sex and travel.

Having survived the near-death experience, we made it to Cafe Luxembourg which was crowded, as expected, but we nabbed a table, collected chairs and took up residence. We did not recognise any of the wait staff and were generally ignored until Jayne lassoed a passing waiter. Shortly thereafter, a beer and a bottle of 'room temperature' chablis arrived. Unconcerned, we chatted with Dave and Vikki and enjoyed the afternoon.

Don't I look fabulous?

Then on to dinner back at Peppinos, that restaurant we so enjoyed the night before last. The restaurant quadrant was filling up with all sorts of interesting people. There was the ubiquitous hen's party from the UK. Each of the girls was wearing a T-shirt with a number, handwritten on the back. Except one, ah, young lady. Her t-shirt said PTO. I'll just leave that there, in case my speculation gets me into trouble.

Our table under the awning provided an excellent view of the passing parade. We ordered some wine and sat chatting as we waited for the first of the meals to arrive. In a brave show of daring and imagination, we had the same entrees as last time. 

Canal life

The title today, dear reader, is somewhat misleading because we didn't spill any wine. (A classic song by Eric Burdon and the Animals, 1970). Neither did our waiter. However, he spilled our entire dinner. All four of them. Somebody had clearly moved a chair by the door to the restaurant, the one that the wait staff use to access the kitchen. Out comes our waiter, tray held high, obscuring his view and then he was gone from sight. Risotto and pasta went flying across the street as our waiter was sent sprawling to the ground. He was clearly shaken and hurt but appeared at our table, still wearing our food on his clothes and in his beard, to apologise for the delay. We were more concerned about him than we were about a delay in our food arriving at the table.

We chatted with him later in the evening. He was still very apologetic but had changed clothes by this time and his injured hand was in a glove with some ice to keep the swelling down.

Sculpture in the garden of the Rijksmuseum

After a very enjoyable evening, we farewelled Dave and Vikki and dawdled back to the hotel for our last night in Amsterdam.

There is not much to report from that point. We were picked up next morning and dropped at the airport. Jayne witnessed an unusual sight in the lounge: a woman, clearly the indecisive type, conducting her own wine tasting at the bar, prior to selecting what she wanted to drink. That was new.

The quintessential Dutch view.

The plane was late leaving which truncated our time at Dubai Airport. We arrived back in Australia on time at 10pm, Sydney time. Europe is such a long way from home and we were in transit for around 28 hours. Despite the discomfort of long distance travel, we are planning our next European assault.

European Reflections

1. The triple US cancers of McDonalds, Burger King and Starbucks are everywhere. Sadly.

2. Cigarettes. Everyone still smokes. Surprisingly. In Amsterdam their smoke smells sweet and strangely reminds me of my undergraduate days at uni.

3. Service. The further east you travel across Europe, the less enthusiastic the service becomes. In fact, many wait staff were afflicted by RBF - not all, of course, some were delightful, but there were many who clearly did not enjoy their work.

4. Sheets. What is it with Europeans and doonas? The doonas are arctic rated and there is no sheet between the doona and you. It is either melt or freeze.

5. Hotel housekeeping can be 'a choose our own adventure' experience: depending who is on duty, you might get your towels changed but not your bed made, you might get your bed made but not your cups and glasses cleaned, you might not get the room attended to at all ...

6. Language #1. A very important Dutch word, 'ongezouten'. It means 'unsalted'. Ignore it at your peril.

7. Language #2. Some of the European languages are seriously taking the piss. In Dutch for instance, the menu is tagged "Eten and Drinkenen". Really? Eating and drinking?

8. COVID. COVID is referred to as "the corona". No one wears a mask, ever, anywhere. If you see a mask it is probably covering the face of an Australian.

Until next time ... November ... Vanuatu.

Heroes (Budapest)

Good morning, dear reader. An early reveal of today's title, a David Bowie classic from 1977. Sing it with me, "If I were king ...". Good times. The reason will be become clear shortly. You will also be relieved to know that this post is relatively brief in comparison to what you've endured to date. We spent the day, well, part of it, on the Hop-on-hop-off bus and the rest relaxing and catching up on processing my photos.

You may recall in my last post, I challenged my children to be the first one to respond. The first to do so would have the title of "favourite child" bestowed upon them. Two of our three offspring replied in a timely fashion. One is yet to acknowledge my request. As is often the case with siblings, there is a dispute as to the actual winner. The decision has been referred to the bunker, NRL style, and the ultimate winner will be revealed throughout the course of this post. To more important matters.

We walked through the Castle District to the funicular this morning and travelled very sedately down the hill to the Danube to catch the Big Bus. We caught a similar contraption in Wellington, New Zealand, some years back. It is certainly a mode of travel from yesteryear and relies on the weight balance of one car going up the hill as the other travels down. Quaint would be the description. This morning's descent was uncrowded and smooth.

Old world charm

The Big Bus was waiting patiently for our arrival at the funicular stop. We presented our pre-purchased tickets and were waved inside by a disinterested staffer. Apparently the concept of service in Hungary is different to that of the western world. We should be grateful the staff are favouring us with their attention. It is most certainly not a case of the customer is always right - and to be honest, I'm OK with that. Anyway, no one checked our tickets which meant they weren't activated, not Pete Evans style, but on the computer that registers we have commenced our 24 hour ride period.

The ubiquitous Parliament

The first two stops were not particularly populated although the bus became very crowded at Parliament. We had chosen to sit upstairs in the open air, well, for COVID risk management, (and also because it brought back childhood memories of travelling with my grandfather in Sydney, as I always made him sit upstairs). As we pulled out from Parliament, the women behind us began to cough. No masks. Not happy. Having come this far, we don't want to catch the plague right before we go on the cruise. The coughing continued intermittently until our stop, Heroes Square in the City Park. Now you understand the title for this post.

On the way to the Park, we stopped outside the Opera House. The one that doesn't appear in the Lonely Planet Guide. We did not alight from the bus. I guess the reality of seeing more golden, over the top decadence was, well, too much. Maybe next time. With a recital.

The Heroes Square is a massive open paved area. In its centre is a 36m tall obelisk topped by the Archangel Gabriel holding the crown of Hungary he/she (do angels have gender? oh, yeah, Catholic church) allegedly offered to St Stephen. Behind it, on both sides are two arced structures, each bearing 7 statues of some of the Kings of Hungary. Very Romanesque, in fact it reminded me of the forecourt at the Vatican. Before the obelisk lies the tomb of the Unknown Soldier (minus any bodies as no one is actually buried there).

From the "Park", we walked to one of the hidden treasures of Budapest, the Vajdahunyad Castle, modelled on Dracula's castle in Transylvania. This had been recommended by Emoke, our tour guide on day 1. We didn't go inside. It was all rather crowded, so we walked the paths outside and photographed statues, as you do. One particular statue, named, wait for it, Anonymous - yeah, I don't get it either, was supposed to be some charm for writers. If you rub the nib of the pen in the statue's hand it improves your prowess as a writer. So, my dear reader, you have noticed the difference in my prose? I rubbed his nib. It's size and shape felt strangely familiar and it all felt wrong somehow.

Nice view with the light poles

Anonymous

The hidden gem castle has the most pathetic moat I've ever seen.  No, seriously, it's dodgy. I could walk through it. And, in a way that even the French would be impressed by, they destroyed the best photographic opportunities by placing large poles in the middle of the vista. We have since learnt that these light poles are there in the middle of the water because the manmade lake becomes a winter time skating rink.

There were still things to explore in this area, but we decided to head back to the bus stop and onto our next destination: the most beautiful café in the world. Allegedly (I don't want to offend anyone).

The New York Café. Special. Cool. Whatever. We made it inside. Just. The waiting area was woefully inadequate for the volume of trade they were doing. There was a mass of people, mostly seated. We weren't seated and weren't likely to be before the coming of the Messiah. First or second coming, depending on your religion. So, like the Australians we are, we left. It's a special space, but really, you're just having coffee. Or worse, tea.

I always look at the ceiling while drinking coffee, generally when it's bad...

Whatever. Hot and tired, we returned to the Big Bus and headed back across the river to Buda and the funicular. There was a queue here as well but it moved at reasonable speed and, given we had tickets from the morning, we were able to skip ahead of a few people who needed to buy theirs.

The plan, when we got to the top, was to head to a bar and have a beer. That was the plan. Reality had other ideas. Every bar was packed. There were tour groups everywhere. OK then, let's head to the Hotel. The Rooftop bar doesn't open until 4pm, so that was out. The downstairs bar, yep, it was also full. There was no room at the inn. The only option was lunch. We repaired to the restaurant and had a typical tourist lunch, the signature burger and a bottle of Hungarian red wine. The view from the restaurant is stunning. It looks across Fisherman's Bastion to the Parliament. It is a vista I never tire of, with the added bonus of people watching.

They serve McGuigan's wine! That was unexpected.

Post lunch it was time to blog and process some photos. Then happy hour in the Executive Lounge. Sadly the children had departed and it was much quieter and more enjoyable without them. 

The following morning was breakfast and packing. We left the hotel to transfer to the AMA Venita that was waiting for us on the Pest side of the Danube. We checked in, left our bags and walked along the river bank towards Parliament. About 300 metres south of the Parliament, there is a memorial to the Jewish people who were shot and thrown into the river during the Second World War. It is a series of period shoes, cast in iron and attached to the promenade. They depict the fact that, before they were shot, the victims were instructed to remove their shoes as these were a valuable commodity in wartime and could be resold. 

Memorials are one of those things. There were people taking selfies or having their photo taken with the shoes. One child had his foot a shoe and was photographed by his mother. All entirely inappropriate. We witnessed similar disrespectful behaviour at the 9/11 memorial in New York.

We then headed back to Duncorso for a lunchtime beer and some people watching before we eventually walked back to the ship. The Venita has a capacity of 164. There are only 71 passengers on this journey so there were plenty of people opting for a cabin upgrade. Having already unpacked, we were not interested.

The 300 year old acacia. The oldest tree in Budapest we are told.

We have met many people already and we were invited to the smaller dining room for dinner to get to know some other passengers. The food was lovely as was the accompanying wine. It was a later night than anticipated which is why this post has now combined two days and is still a day late.

Getting back to the favourite child situation ... the bunker has just made a decision ... it's coming through now ... it's Caitlin.

Until tomorrow.