Coaster trip preamble - Amsterdam!

This summer I (Paul) went on a roller coaster tour with the American Coaster Enthusiasts (ACE) Europe region. It was a week-long organized bus tour to parks in Denmark and Sweden, but it started at the Amsterdam airport. I took the opportunity to fly in two days early to explore Amsterdam a bit and add on an additional theme park. I have been to Amsterdam once before, but it was only for a one-day layover on my way to Egypt way back in 2008, so I was excited to visit again and explore the city.

After an overnight flight, I landed in Amsterdam at 8AM on a Thursday, and took a train to my hotel, the Met Hotel. It was only one stop on the train from the airport, a very convenient location since I'd have to go back to the airport to start the coaster tour. It was a nice mostly residential neighborhood with good tram access so I could get into the city in a matter of minutes. It was also quite a bit cheaper than city-center hotels, despite being very nice. Would recommend! Since it was still so early my room wasn't ready yet, so I dropped off my bag and took the tram toward the city. My destination was the Rijksmuseum, but I got off the tram a little early so I could walk through Vondelpark. It was a nice urban park that reminded me of Piedmont Park in Atlanta. It was a pleasant walk on a sunny morning, although it was surprisingly warm. From there I continued on and spent a couple hours in the Rijksmuseum. It's a large museum in a cool building, with a large amount of Dutch art. One of the main attractions, Rembrandt's The Night Watch, was undergoing conservation but there was a neat exhibit describing how they preserve the nearly 400 year old painting.

After the museum, I strolled around central Amsterdam for a while, taking in the canals and architecture. Amsterdam is a nice city, and the center was understandably packed with tourists. Some areas were quite charming, but there were also a lot of chain stores and tourist traps, ranging from Madame Tussaud's and Ripley's Believe it or Not to McDonalds and the Nike Store. Eventually I took the train back to my hotel, and stayed in for the evening since it started to rain and I was exhausted from the red eye flight and time change.

You know you're in the Netherlands when this is the bike parking at the train station!

A pleasant morning walk through the park.

Just a cat hanging out at the Rijksmuseum.

The main hall of the museum.

Big-head last supper?

Expectations...

...vs reality. Yes, this area was super crowded!

Big ol' ship.

They had a Van Gogh self portrait!

Nice views while walking.

A quaint shopping street.

Lots of amazing architecture all around.

Dam square, which is tourist central.

There's an underground bike garage!

The next morning I met up with two other coaster enthusiasts (Rob and Scott) and we drove about an hour and a half east to Walibi Holland amusement park. I really wanted to visit, since the park has  a couple of well-regarded coasters but wasn't included on the official coaster tour. Luckily other people had the same idea, and Rob offered to drive since he had a rental car already. It was a sunny, relatively busy day, but we got fast passes to help out with the lines. The park used to be a Six Flags, so I didn't have the highest expectations, but it was actually a pretty nice park. We rode all of the coasters, and rode our favorites several times, and also hit up some of the non-coaster rides including Merlin's Magic Castle, and had a nice long lunch (schnitzel) in an air conditioned restaurant. There was a huge music festival called Defqon.1 right next to the park, which didn't seem to impact crowds too much, but it was really cool to see and hear the festival from the lift hills of the roller coasters. We stayed at the park for the entire time it was open (10-6), and then Rob drove us back to our hotels. I ended the day getting some take away dinner from Le'meone, a Syrian restaurant which had excellent falafel. I ate at table in small park next to my hotel, where a woman practicing cello. Nice end to a nice day! 

Lost Gravity was a surprise for me - excellent coaster!

The photogenic first drop.

Untamed was a great coaster, but maybe a bit overrated.

Goliath is probably the best coaster in the park.

The "Exotic" section, which was Mexican themed.

This ride looks amazing, but is horribly rough.

Lunch time after we got all of the coaster credits in.

The nice little park where I ate dinner.

Fattoush and falafel. Yum!

I love how residences address the streets! It's such a safe city you can just leave your bikes and toys on the sidewalk.

That ended my time in Amsterdam, as the next morning I'd be heading straight to the airport to join the roller coaster tour. Amsterdam has great urbanism, with good transit and bike paths. There's also a lot of construction everywhere, and new modern development to contrast with the historic buildings. It's an iconic city and definitely worth visiting.