Busy Lively Lovely Amsterdam-A treat for eyes and spirit

-Ultimate inadvertent photobombing territory!-

This city just makes you feel good. There is life on every corner-in shops, bicyclists, mopeds, and people. 

The city doesn't seem to sleep. Our travels around Amsterdam are not over but thanks to our location in the Overtoomse Sluis neighborhood in West Amsterdam, we are spitting distance from amazing places to visit, wander, and observe the natives in their natural habitat. We are along a main tram line and within a ten minute bike ride of Amsterdam Centraal and a billion more places to spend time shopping, canal-hopping, or hanging out with a Heineken and people-watching along the Red Light District. Ok, we pretty much bolted through Amsterdam's famous sex-hued streets as the kids were only slightly entertained but mostly embarrassed that we'd even trek that direction with them in tow.:)

We opted on our second day to journey on foot so Izzy could spend time taking photos in Vondelpark and we could slow our pace after our exhilarating bike ride throug Amsterdam's Nine Streets and all the areas in between.

-Vondelpark-

 As far as biking in Amsterdam, it's not a matter of whether you are brave enough to fall into order--or chaos- with bike freeways that run alongside the many canals. You have to do it. When I asked Izzy what she thought of biking here, she smiled and laughed hysterically-it made both kids happy to ride through Amsterdam.

 It's the easiest way to get around the city. The bike rules and everyone knows it so the few drivers on the road go slowly and the scooters are trying to figure out whether they are bikes or vehicles. The chaos is acceptable in this city where multimodal transportation options are the norm-Denver is still learning and growing to be a terrific biking city. Bikeways are separated from pedestrian sidewalks and from the vehicles on busier straats then softly combined onto the smaller cobbled pathways that everyone shares. Once you are sitting atop your upright city cruiser (we have four of them graciously offered by our Air BB hosts as transportation) you start pedaling and immediate fall into the pleasantry of the simple journey through the cobbled neighborhood to the Overtoomse, the busy east-west street that bisects our quiet residential high density townhome neighborhood from Vondelpark. The park is a favorite place already, full of yoga-goers, bootcampers, pot smokers (no we don't need any of that since its legal in our state:)) and families often lying down staring into the partly cloudy skies or looking off into the many lakes and water sprays through high tree canopies that shape the park's multiple pathways.

-Father and Son-

We wandered though the park and right into a fascinating survey of Henri Matisse at the modern art Stedelijk Museum. While I would never fancy myself a lover of fine art or the stuffiness of wandering an art exhibit to grasp meaning in each piece, I've found the art exhibitions in Europe do a really lovely job of teaching viewers about the foundations of the artist's early works to the more mature pieces that become familiar in elementary art class education. 

Art class for the day: Matisse fell ill later in his career, preventing him from standing to paint on the canvas as much. Instead, he adapted cubism, pointillism, and fauvism forms to create his unique chosen forms of paper cutout art-the Matisse you might know with bright vivid colors, somewhat abstract shapes resulted from the work of his asistants who would paste up the cut forms and poise them at his directive to create works like Oceania. It was then Matisse's eye for brilliant original colors that finished the pieces to create happy, fun and accessible pieces that even made Andy Warhol exclaim he "wanted to be Matisse." While I know I enjoyed the exhibit more than my family, they never howled once and let me enjoy that moment-another victory in family vacation.

We continued to cruise via canal taxibus, another way to traverse Amsterdam along its beautiful flower lined canals. 

We hopped on and off following a cruise around the Eye where the Amstel River flows out to the sea and where architecturally speaking, Amsterdam turns into an entirely different landscape of modernist forms and water industry. 

-not sure who tried this first-Amsterdam or Oslo-

Amsterdam is really the most lovely city to explore in depth. There is so much to see! Tomorrow, it's off to Sherlocked!-an escape room adventure that will truly test our ability to function as a family of four-Weeeeee!!!! If we make it out alive, we will head out for a day trip to Belgium.:)

Our introduction to Amsterdam

The flight to Amsterdam was only 2.5 hours. We landed around 10:00 PM, which was still light enough to see from the air that the entire country seems to sit on the surface of the water, allowing the tides to enter deep into the city and return to the sea at will. We found our own entry an easy one as well, due to Deirdre's confident route finding on the public transit system. We arrived at the door of our AirBnB, lugging our packs, and feeling ready to grab a quick bite and sack out. Ten minutes later, we had finally figured out how to unlock the door and, in the process, had fully announced ourselves to the surrounding neighborhood as loud Americans of low IQ.

We spent another ten minutes figuring out the lights and the sleeping arrangements and depositing our stuff and then struck out in hopes, albeit dim, of finding food. To our surprise there was - wouldn't you know it - a pizza / Surinamese place still open around the corner. We happily ordered, only to find they couldn't process our card; something to do with a hoked up credit system in the Netherlands that can't handle anything foreign. The proprietor knew where we could find an ATM, but his description of the route in broken English was no better than the gyrations of a honey bee to us, so he offered to have his employee, who was probably his nephew as well, transport one of our party on the back of his mo-ped. I mounted up behind Akmed and off we went, bottoming out the suspension on every bump. He was an expert pilot and we were there in 5 minutes, back in 15 and eating our pizza's back home again by midnight. We all thought the whole episode was hilarious and a sure sign of more adventures to come. We hit the hay around 1:00 AM, and I don't remember the rest. 

Observations of the world's 4th wealthiest country and the heart of Oslo

Our time in Oslo was as busy as one could expect for the family of an urban planner.

Well deserved down time.:) the family that blogs together stays together...and I'm sure that's what they are all doing here...

We stayed Oslo's St. Hanshaugen neighborhood along Waldemar Thranes Gate,a street bookended by Norway's Kaffebrenniet (like Starbucks), an assortment of wonderful pastry shops and Deli Luca (like a 7-11 convenience store with fancier food and no gas station).




With many blocks of beautiful midrise density housing through the neighborhood to downtown, the neighborhood hosts a younger crowd and and can best be explained as Oslo's RINO (for Denverites).

We found there was so much to do between museums, outdoor sculpture parks and waterfront activity that we abandoned our plans to zoom out of Oslo and made it a study in City life. We saw a terrific exhibit at the Munch Museum comparing Munch and VanGogh-their paths never crossed but they were like twins from birth in their use of color and retreat from established forms.




We were also humbled by a visit to the Nobel Peace Center-on exhibit was Malala. Not only was I again sobered by her great bravery and young wisdom but torn inside to view on exhibit the outfit she was wearing when she was shot on the bus.

Observations on the street-

Traversing the city of Oslo on foot and via transit provides an even clearer picture of what we noticed to be a lack of social stratification in Oslo, an observation confirmed by our Air B&B host, a 38 year old Indian journalist and her Danish husband Esben. Mala explained that Norway is the 4th richest country in the world-this promise has brought a multicultural infusion of people, business, and youth seeking the awesomeness that is so often found in every big metropolitan city like Denver😘 Other things found in big cities-like poverty and visible suffering-were almost nonexistent until you got to the Centre station where Romanians have come to seek better fortune in begging. Apparently this is not received well and Norwegians don't know how to act in the presence of outward suffering-according to our hosts it's big topic now.

While Oslo's transit system is tops, it's lack of street life and activation of public space in important downtown areas that link the Royal Palace to the business district and the piers to Oslo's CentreStation transit hub might compromise its metropolitan desires.



The Opera House-




Centre Station Transit and Shopping-

Unless you are traversing the newly built luxurious western waterfront with 20 similarly fashioned restaurants and bars, there is a dearth of casual eateries and desirable public hangouts north into the older downtown.




There is a lot of potential for more greatness yet to come for Oslo and I hope more of Norway's oil cash could be funneled into activating the downtown's fabulous historic structures along the many gates leading to the Centrum (streets and blocks) as well as ensuring the increasing diverse social classes all find a place here.

The wealth is evident along the Oslo waterfront's western bank and on the steep banks of the Oslo fjords. 1000 SF Summer homes -along with their very small 10 sqM bathHouses go for millions on the fjords.

These houses were built at first for the women of Oslo to have a place to bathe away from the men on the fjords. Now they are idyllic little highly desired million dollar summer teen hideouts dotting the base of the fjord banks.

On our boat tour around the fjords our young Jordan doppelgänger tour guide provided great insight into the history and culture of Norway, the Country's strong Christian foundation and strong resistance to other religions lent to renaming Oslo to Kristiana for years before the country realized its future was destine to be built with a growing non-Christian population despite the fact that there is little to no separation of church and state even today. Now, the exceptionally rich and Christian royals and their friends own their own private little islands around the fjord. The current infusion of oil money from Norway's Statoil Company is building Oslo's eastern bank with thousands of glass encased multifamily structures resulting in rise to an eclectic and somewhat confused architectural landscape. Our tour guide mentioned that the new buildings are being expressly designed to create better public spaces. Framed by the Oslo Opera House, an amazing white geometric multi-elevated building atop the waterfront, I am sure these new buildings will add to the cool vibe.

We loved our stay, our walks in the rain, our endless days (sun up at 3:30am and down at 10:30pm) and our transit rides up and down the city streets. Oslo's heart is still growing and I look forward to its evolution. It was also our first international travel experience as a family of four and needless to say, we worked out a few kinks (no, it had NOTHING to do with Deirdre's strong will to control the transit plan for the day...) to ensure everyone's experience will be of their own making. It's beautiful to have our kids traverse the continent with us and we look forward to our next adventure in Amsterdam and surrounds!

Oslo, day 1

We finally made it Oslo late last night. Izzy says the Airports in Iceland and Oslo look like Ikea's. They are efficient and well layed out. We could learn a thing or two from these Norsky's.
We are rested again, but at this time of year the sun comes up at 3:30 AM and goes down around 10ish, so my circadian rhythm is still off by half a beat.

The city ignores the sun for a few hours, so I lay awake for two hours with only the squawk of ravens and the sunshine. The kids were even slower to get moving, which was expected. They have trouble keeping up with their elders. We brunched at Kaffebrenniet, which is hip and tasty. There are a lot of young people in rolled up shorts or skinny jeans and tee-shirts, riding bikes or strolling. The men are pushing strollers as often as the women and nobody seems to be in a hurry. We walked West to the Royal palace and then on to Frogner park, busy with families relaxing and full of sculptures depicting people in all stages of life and relationship with each other. We took our pictures with them, adding ourselves to their commentaries.

We made the mistake of hitting the most touristy part of town for Lupper and after giving up waiting to be seated at the first place we tried, wound up having American style pizza. The waitress assumed we were Norwegian and said something very strange. When we looked at her uncomprehendingly, she tried English; "What would you like to drink?" Wow, that was not what I would have guessed. For all I knew she had asked something about our level of skill playing a game involving a cat, a beanbag chair and waffles.

After eating we hit the Nobel Peace Museum by the water front and learned about Malala and I managed not to weep in public. Then we climbed to the top of the city's fortress and watched a cruise ship set out from the harbor as the sun sat low, setting the boats and buildings off in brilliant colors and high contrast. We hiked home and played volleyball on a nearby soccer pitch until 10:00 PM. Phew!

We made it to Reykjavik for our Blue Lagoon Stopover!

Quick flight to Iceland and here we are...arriving on July 26th after a smooth 6 hour journey, we deplaned to a surreal moonscape shaped by volcanic mountains in the distance and enveloped in an overcast and rainy blanket of a new country. Adventure awaits at the Blue Lagoon, a geothermal pool and spa favorite of tourists who find themselves hovering in the middle of the northern Atlantic en route to Europe. Iceland is beautiful and so are the people-we look forward to our two day stopover upon our return to Denver in August. For now, I can't imagine a better way to begin our adventure than to SIT STILL and enjoy a warm thermal pool...after all, it's only 50 degrees here.) 

The pool is a cozy 100 degrees and offers the benefits of a mineral dip accompanied by freely accessed vats of  pasty white silica gel (like yogurt) to spread all over your body. In fact, swimmers (American, Icelandic, German and Canadian as we observed) applied it with wreckless abandon assured by other visitors of its miracle skin-softening qualities but nobody was really sure it did anything other than test your own ability to spread the stuff evenly-or-not onto your pasty white body. One guy even dipped his whole beautiful bald head in it and proudly walked around the lagoon feeling he was among those of similar ilk.

The most enjoyable part was observing  this beautiful cultural soup of language and bodies and smiles sharing the pot for this moment. Now...on to Oslo-the heritage homeland of Ivan and the kids. 

WHAT????!!!!$$$&&@ You're leaving??

We love our fur babies. They are perpetual toddlers and offer unconditional love in good times and bad. They communicate easily and have very simple needs. This is the mentality I would like to impart on our own family of two-legged as we depart for a continent thousands of miles from here. Our ways should be as simple as that of our pets. I know, however, that the human agenda is far more complex and...well...we have teenagers. That said, it is a world quite known to us as far as communication challenges and we will be prepared for taking in the wonders of Europe together-even if our moods don't always match.

As for the dogs and the cat, Margo and Robert are now entrusted with their care and they will undoubtedly continue to fall in love with our fur babies...as long as we can exit our bathroom to get to the airport.:)

It's getting real...

22:10 and we are ALMOST packed...

PACKING...Finally!

From Deirdre...

The week has been long-longer than I could have imagined as I learned how to be a 'lady of leisure'-with 7 medical appointments, volunteer/work related meetings, violin performances, and some actual leisure time playing volleyball with Izzy and getting to know the kids between 9 and 5. Most of you will likely pass judgment quickly to say I have not yet learned how to be 'leisurely' so I will take any and all advice on how to SIT STILL...or maybe an endless flight to Iceland will help with that task:) 

The house sitters have arrived!

Margo and Robert arrived yesterday, a bit earlier than we expected, but that's for the better because they are lovely people so the extra time to get acquainted has been great.

True to our style, (cramming 10 pounds of stuff into a 5 pound sack), we also had the new neighbors over for cocktails. The dogs, the neighbors and the house-sitters all got familiar and everyone was very well behaved... even the dogs.

I'm afraid we went on about our city and our neighborhood, so much so that I started to wonder why we would ever want to leave it for vacation! Denver is a great city, but I know there's better gelato in Italy, and there's probably some other neat stuff. We went to dinner at the Rio on Blake and even though it was a bit on the late side, the place was lively and packed and the food was good.

I'm working today, struggling not to go into full vacation mode prematurely. It seems the universe has conspired to make me earn every minute of this vacation in the week leading up to it. There is still a lot of preparation to do, like packing, and I'm missing a few articles of clothing, like pants, shoes and socks. I hear they wear pants in Europe.

From Deirdre..

How do I feel right now? I am preparing in the next hour to leave a job after 9 wonderful years, planning to attend a weekend wedding in New York, then coming home for a week to pack for Europe. I feel like the world awaits and it's mine for the taking...and SOOO much to do before we actually leave - my biggest fear - NOT MAKING OUR FLIGHT!!! In typical hilarious Oss fashion -we push it until the last minute-we forget identification, underwear, tickets, etc.  Most of what we need is online, so as long as we get WIFI in the corners we visit, we feel like success is at our doorstep. :)
 So which parts of the world will we take advantage of first?

ICELAND! 

We'll start in Iceland, land of the midnight sun, to take in a day trip while awaiting our flight to Oslo, Norway. We will spend 3 wonderful days in Norway exploring city and country.

OSLO



We will jet set to Amsterdam for a five-day staycation and day travel around the City by bicycle, by train around Benelux visiting Belgium, Brussels and everything we can in between.

AMSTERDAM


Next Stop: The Rhine River Valley in Germany en route to Switzerland then Italy where we will spend our last of three weeks with my mom's family who will travel to Italy to celebrate multiple retirements, birthday milestones, and well...lots of good wining and dining!

Here's the castle in Germany that - if we can actually find it-will host us for two nights of R&R before our next leg south.

CASTLE LIEBENSTEIN


I'll save the next half for when we actually figure it out. We have a couple of unplanned days to head south, so each kid will get a day to plan, figure out the train system, and tell us where we are going. Nothing will go wrong with that plan, surely...

Stay Tuned!!!!