“Time and tide waits for no man,” a phrase that comes to us from Geoffrey Chaucer – as one of the earliest documenters of travel and travellers, we’ll draft him as a spiritual ancestor of this blog. See? We’re not all dumb puns around here. How is this relevant, you ask? Um… did you notice the cool literary reference? Ok, fiiiine. The point is, we were enjoying the trip even more than we had anticipated, but the end was rushing up on us and there was no helping it. One last descent into the depths of Amsterdam (not hard, considering the city averages -7 ft. below sea level. See? We’re not not dumb puns around here, either…) before a cab gets us to our direct flight to Porto.
We needed to check out from our hotel after breakfast but still had a day in the city, so we left our bags with the accomodating staff. Honestly, we short-changed this place in our last post. The Hyatt Regency Amsterdam was an exceptionally great hotel. The reception area is spacious and full of comfy over-stuffed furniture, offering a cozy place to hang out. The overall vibe is green and jungle-y, with loads of houseplants, solid wood desk/tables under glass lamps, and green plant themed wall decor. It’s an outstanding antidote to the gray outside.
We had access to the Regency Club, an upgrade for Hyatt members. This gave us loads of free amenities like a continental breakfast, all-day snacks and coffee, and a “happy hour” complete with several kinds of salad, Indonesian rice, sweets, fruit, cheeses, champagne, wine, sodas, and juice. The Club is a great place to hang out instead of the lobby, much quieter (except during happy hour!), and full of plugs for working.
Our room was standard for this property, but top of the line. The shower was huge, had both a rainfall and handheld hardware, with great pressure, and got as hot as you could wish. The closet was well-thought out, with plenty of hanging space (and proper hangers!), room for our big suitcase, a shelf above and below for shoes and whatnot, PLUS (ta da!) five good-sized shelves. In the room was a good chair for reading, with a tall back and lamp nearby, a desk and chair for work, a king bed, nightstands, and an ottoman perfect for sitting on to remove shoes. Of course there was a good-sized TV, and reading lamps for each side of the bed. The mattress was great, although the pillows were fluffy rather than supportive. SIGH. Its my ever-lasting sorrow that hotel guests seem to like poofy pillows. Maybe I’m the only traveling side-sleeper?
This whole trip, we’ve looked for interesting-sounding dining opportunities; casual or dressy, simple food or funky. Regardless, we always try to be respectful of the establishment and present ourselves nicely. Not ballgown and tux but, you know, nice. 100% of the time, we’ve overshot the vibe and come in at least a little overdressed. You’d think we’d be used to the dress-down nature of most of Europe, but alas. So finally, on this last big meal day, we say “screw it”; we’re going to be doing some sight-seeing after lunch, so let’s keep it simple. So naturally, when we walk into Bridges we see that, at the table next to ours, the men are in suits and the woman is in Chanel. Flippin’ perfect. Of course, in the manner of truly fine places (as opposed to pretentious) no mention was made nor merest concern observed. Nope, it’s cool. Probably not the first tourists to walk in like that, but we try, ya know? Anyway, we forgot all about what anybody was wearing, or even what clothes are, as we settled into a truly scrumptuous five-course tasting menu while looking out the window at the traffic, aquatic and otherwise, in and along the canal. We seriously could not have enjoyed that meal more if we’d been paid to do it.
After lunch at Bridges we crossed several more…. bridges that is (herp derp), to scamper to our canal tour (Pure Boats’ Ultimate Canal Cruise) shortly before it left. The weather continued to be kinda gross, so the semi-transparent plastic covers stayed in placed, which meant we saw some interesting things but decent pictures were hard to come by. Everyone else in the boat (there were about 9 of us) were Americans, either immigrants or tourists, and it was lovely to sort of catch up on the vibe back in the States while answering the usual questions (“Wait, where do you live? How does that work?”). This isn’t the most evocative description, but honestly while it was a pleasant way to pass a couple of hours, it didn’t blow our minds with information or anecdotes.
Our time thus passed, we began the process of unspooling our travels and getting back home. Now this was an evocative experience, starting with a lounge at Amsterdam Schiphol Airport. Thanks to… I dunno, a credit card, we have a benefit called “Priority Pass” which gets you access to ostensibly-premium lounges in airports all over the world. Sometimes you end up getting into the business class lounge of an actual airline, and those can vary in quality but are some degree of “fine”. The Priority Pass lounge at AMS (aka “Aspire”), however, is in serious need of updating. Many pseudo-leather seats are ripped exactly where one would put their bottom. Packing tape holds edging to walls and baseboards. Most of the food and drink comes from machinery, although there was some selection of hot food (soup and noodles) available when we were there at 19:00. It was… rough. Staff were unable to keep up with necessary clearing of dishes, leaving people to clear vacated spaces by moving used items to nearby flat surfaces (see photo for an example). They were moving as quickly as possible, but I would say there needed to be at least one more person (and probably more) to help. The lighting was 70s fluorescent, and not in any of the good ways. What made it seem worse was the lovely natural look-and-feel lighting over the food areas and in tiny 2-person booths around the periphery. Clearly the coveted spaces for those in the know. On the plus side, there were plenty of plugs to charge with, people in the lounge were pretty respectful of space and noise levels (even the children were pretty much quiet). And, ranking very high on the “made it ok” vector — it was NOT the gate.
Pleasant or not, it gave us a place to wait out an hour or two, and from there we were an easy delivery. The flight was fine, with no troubles, and the steadfast Orlando (seriously, this guy needs a spotlight shined on him when we get a quiet minute) met us at OPO to ferry us home. We’ve said it a few times now, but this was a lovely trip that accomplished everything we wanted. The only downside is we now have “longer trip to Vienna and Amsterdam” added to our to-do list.
