>So, it’s bank holiday weekend in the UK, no plans and in need of a short break? Then Amsterdam is in easy reach – a mere 1 hour flight time (excluding the ubiquitious 2 hour check-in time and travel to/from the airport) from the UK, Amsterdam is perfect for that short break.

My stay coincided in with Queens Day, a national holiday in the Netherlands. On arrival at Central station I was greeted with closed streets and no trams running – Amsterdam had been all but pedestrianised; traffic replaced with stall holders setting up shop for the carnival atmosphere that was to come later that day. The weather itself wasn’t great -grey with light drizzle – but everywhere you looked there was a sea of orange that brought a lift to all that.

With no trams running, I headed north on foot in search of Vondel Park, and ultimately my hotel. Even at 10am the park was bustling with families who were selling toys, sweets, inviting passers by the play old fashioned games and playing music – a tradition on Queens Day I’m told.

Queens day aside, Amsterdam is renound for art and museums – well, two at least. It is home to both the Van Gogh museum – the largest collection of Van Gogh work in the world, and the Anne Frank museum. I confess I saw neither, preferring instead to lose myself in the side streets and take in the canals and architecture of the city.

I spent my penultimate day in nearby Utrecht, a 40mins train ride away, where I met up with a friend I travelled within in Australia. Mirjam and I had not seen each other for 3 years, and it was great to catch up. To carry on the tradition of not climbing things (I’m sure an earlier blog re: the Kings Canyon, in Australia makes mention of the first time we failed to climb something), Mirjam thought I might like to go up the Dom tower in Utrecht. We’d not long missed a tour and the next was in 2 hours. With the weather not so great we instead hit the shops, had a few biers and reminisced of the times we had travelling from Adelaide to Darwin.