Amsterdam and northward…then on to Greece

by | Sep 2, 2022 | Photography

This time I am writing from Athens, Greece. But first I wanted to post the last pics from our day north of Amsterdam with our outstanding guide, Hans. I found Hans (as well as our guides in Athens and Barcelona) through Tours by Locals. We have used this company before and they are all over the world. The reviews on the site are usually right on and can be trusted. We have found you get some great local insights you would not get from a ship tour because these are the people who live right there. You learn so much.

Hans met us right on time at our hotel and we were off. Since we had already toured Amsterdam on a prior visit, we were looking to see the outskirts of the city as well as some of the countryside. Hans did a great job of doing just that. See the photo captions for some of what we saw. Don’t forget, if you click the first shot, you can then scroll through with your arrow keys or by swiping…and PLEASE…don’t look at my photography on a phone. Please…

On to Athens

We had dinner the night of our northern Netherlands tour at a place Kathleen and I had eaten at on our last trip that Jamie and Steve wanted to try—Restaurant Zaza. It’s a short cab ride from the Banks Mansion. It was just as good as it had been in 2016, it both service and food. Had a great time.

The next day we had a flight to Athens at 12:20 pm. The hotel as well as every post we had seen online suggested we get to the Schipol Airport no later than four hours before we flew. So off we went at 8:00 am and check my previous post for how we did at the airport. The flight itself was “fine” (you know what that means) and they gave us an actual sandwich…not really, it was just two pieces of VERY stale bread with a single slice of the worst cheese in The Netherlands between it ?. But they got us (AND OUR LUGGAGE) there almost on time and as soon as we got to baggage claim a rep from Viking Cruises met us and whisked us and our luggage away to a waiting coach for our almost hour-long trip to our hotel, the Athens Marriott. You should know that this hotel was not our choice, but Viking’s as we are now in their care on our pre-cruise extension. I will say that it is a very nice Marriott, it has the best water pressure EVER (I took too many long showers) but it is located in a very non-photographic part of town. The first night I tried taking a photo walk and you will see what I came up with below. Then in my next post I will show you shots of the Athens you were expecting.

Watch the next post for my report on a very HOT but rewarding day in Athens.

I like the look of a windmill. —Jeff Duncan

We Made It! And Amsterdam is (was) Wonderful!

by | Sep 1, 2022 | Air travel, Food Experiences, Photography

As I write this we are packing to leave Amsterdam, brave the craziness of Schipol Aiport and fly south to Athens. We have loved staying two nights at our favorite hotel in the world, the Banks Mansion.

Us in our seats. A shot to send the grandkids

We had a fairly uneventful flight to AMS. We were flying in Business Class on Delta—this is what the airline calls Delta One and we were not incredibly impressed. Everything was just “fine” and if you read this blog on a regular basis, you know that “fine” means that everything was OK but nothing that really stands out. We did have decent, lie-flat seats but they were tight with not enough leg room for me. The padding was a little better than we had on British Air on our last foray to Europe in 2019. And they did feed us pretty well as you can see. Not the best airline meal we have ever had (that was on Cathay Pacific) but good and filling.

We touched down in Amsterdam a little early and thought how great that was as we taxied towards the terminal but then our pilot came on and said that because we were early, they had no place left for us to park the plane s we would just have to sit there and wait until the plane that was at our gate left. Then we were told that the plane at our gate had a mechanical problem and would not be moving so we had to wait to be assigned to another gate which might be an hour. How fun. In the meantime, I was getting texts from my brother that their experience at the airport (they had arrived about three hours before we came from LAX) had not been a good one. Lots of lines and lots of waiting for luggage. So we expected the worst.

It was not to be. In minutes after getting his text, the plane found a gate, we were off, got to passport control and where we were the ONLY ones in line, got to baggage claim and (after walking by rows and rows of unclaimed bags that did not meet their connections) our bags appeared on the belt within minutes. We grabbed them and were off to the hotel. Where this had taken my brother and sister-in-law (from this point on referred to as Steve and Jamie ?) almost 2 hours to do, we landed, exited the airport and were at the hotel in less time than that. I certainly hope our trip today is as uneventful. But we have been warned to be at the airport EARLY. So we are about to go eat breakfast and head to the airport at 8:00 am for a 12:20 flight. I will pause now and be back to you soon.

And now we are sitting in the Aspire Airport Lounge at Schiphol airport. Getting into the airport and through security was nowhere near as bad as we expected. Our cab came for us at 8:15 and we had an almost uneventful ride to the airport (our driver got pulled over for not wearing his seat belt—which he was—the police just didn’t see it). It was easy to get in and check our bags and then about a 35-minute security line and now we have found a lounge that accepts the Priority Pass that we get free with our Chase Sapphire Reserve Visa cards and are relaxing for a couple of hours before we head to Athens.

A couple of quick notes about our travels so far. Kathleen had recently found us some new, LIGHTER luggage. Our two big, checkable bags had gotten really old and were falling apart. It was time and she found us some wonderful and very LIGHT bags from TravelPro. They come with wheels front and back and are really, really light. But they are plain and boring looking and don’t come in a lot of colors. Basically blue (hers) and black (mine). The problem is, that they blend in with every other bag on a luggage carousel. We used to rely on some orange handle wraps but now everyone has those. And then Kathleen found us some really cool luggage covers and I love them. When we got to Schiphol I can guarantee you there was nothing like them on the carousel. They are made of a lycra-like material with a zipper at the bottom and on the sides and you just pull them over your suitcase and zip them up. For less than $20 they were an awesome find.

Our stop in Amsterdam

Now that you have heard about the trip, here’s what we did in Amsterdam.

  • Checked into The Banks Mansion located almost in the center of Amsterdam. Steps away from every place. Museums in one direction, the port and downtown in the other. We stayed there before in 2016 and loved it. We literally think it is the best hotel we have ever stayed in. The beds, bedding and pillows are the most comfortable hotel beds ever, the included breakfast is fantastic and very filling and the view of the canal from our (upgraded room) windows was amazing. You can see one of Amsterdam’s largest canals and the street the hotel is on. You can see Kathleen, Steve and Jamie in the window of Kathleen and my suite here. Forgot to mention that the Banks is all-inclusive. No extra charges for everything including the bar in the “Living Room.” And the service is amazing. Ask for anything and it just appears. Like a taxi or a boarding pass printout.
  • Went to dinner at Moeder’s, a traditional Dutch restaurant. Moeders in Dutch translate to Mother’s and the restaurant is completely COVERED in photos of people’s mothers. They are still accepting them so we could have left one of our Mom’s pics if we had a print with us. The food was good, and the service was excellent.
  • The next morning after sleeping off our jet lag Steve and I went off on a pre-dawn Photowalk. Got some great pics of downtown and near the port as a glorious sunrise made our early morning walk worth getting up for. Photos from that walk are below. Don’t forget, if you click the first shot, you can then scroll through with your arrow keys or by swiping…and PLEASE…don’t look at my photography on a phone. Please…
  • Then it was back to the Banks where after having a wonderful breakfast, we were picked up by Hans from Tours By Locals who took us on a tour outside (mostly north) of Amsterdam. Since we had seen most of the city during the 2016 visit, we wanted to see the outlying areas. Hans did a great job of showing us the countryside including a visit to a still-working windmill (one of the few). See the photos for more info about that tour.

It’s time to head to the gate for our flight so I will have to show you our windmill pics in the next post. See you in Athens.

Air travel dehydrates people.  —Michael J. Knowles

And We’re Off!

by | Aug 28, 2022 | Air travel

It’s almost time to start our big journey. Just before 2:00 pm on Monday, our good friend Marjorie is going to pick us up and take us to Seattle-Tacoma International Airport where we will check in with Delta and wait about three hours until we are scheduled to take off on flight 144, a non-stop to Amsterdam at 5:20 pm (just about 24 hours from when I am writing this). We did a COVID test this morning and we are good to go. Our meals on the plane are ordered and after we eat dinner, I will get our boarding passes printed out.

We are supposed to get into Amsterdam at 12:20 on Tuesday afternoon (that’s our route above). Hopefully, we will be on time and picked up at the airport and transported to what we believe is the greatest hotel on planet Earth, The Banks Mansion. By the time we walk into the “Living Room” at The Banks, my brother and sister-in-law should be sitting there having a drink (free bar!!!) and waiting for us to join them.

We are then headed to a traditional Dutch dinner at Moeder’s. Probably going to have stamppot, a traditional Dutch dish. According to Wikipedia, it’s Dutch comfort food. We had it the last time we were in Amsterdam and it was wonderful.

We will spend the next day (Wednesday) touring Amsterdam, going to the Van Gogh museum and having dinner at Restaurant ZaZa which we loved on our last visit to Amsterdam. Then early next morning we will all head to the busiest airport in Europe, Schipol, where we will catch our 12:20 pm flight to Athens, Greece. Hopefully, we will arrive pretty close to when we are supposed to, meet our other traveling companions (my sister-in-law’s sister and her husband) and hopefully head to dinner at a traditional Greek restaurant I have reservations for.

The next day we will tour Athens with Alexios from Tours By Locals (a tour company we have used before and I love). Then another dinner in the Plaka district. The other thing we have to do on Friday is to take a COVID test. Here’s a strange situation. Greece requires a COVID test to LEAVE their country. I get it when someplace wants to keep COVID out of their country by testing those coming in. But to require a test only for people leaving their country makes no sense.

Then next Saturday, we will board the Viking Sky for our 21-day cruise. Viking calls it the Mediterranean & Adriatic Sojurn. Here’s where we are going.

For Kathleen and I this will be a chance to revisit many places we have been. For the rest of our group, this will be their first time in this part of the world. Although we have been to most every place after we leave Sicily, we have never been to most of the stops in the Adriatic Sea. We have spent time in Venice and it has always been one of our favorite cities. It was really the first place we ever went to in Europe. Luckily for us, we have almost three full days in Venice. Our good buddies (and always neighbors, Jayesh and Lisa) were there last month and did some scouting for us, finding us some amazing restaurants to try. We can’t wait to try.

So I want to invite you to virtually follow us on this journey. I will do my best to post here on a very regular basis but with not a single sea day on this trip, I might run a little late. And of course, it also depends on the quality of the WiFi on the ship. So make sure you have subscribed so you can keep up with the ports. You know how much I love to share our travels. See you soon, right here.

The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only a page.
—St. Augustine