Guus Bosman

Thursday morning we took a 9.00 o'clock train from Hoorn, the nearest city to my parent's town Middenmeer.

There are a couple of new shops at the trainstation and we bought a cup of coffee in one of the new ones. The gentleman serving was very slow and mumbling under his breath "what was it that I was doing again?" but the coffee was great. The train was crowded but we managed to get a seat.

On the picture above the historical tram station of Hoorn (not the actual train station).

Mieke had taken a day off from work and my father has his own business and has flexible hours, so we had the whole day together which was great. We walked from Amsterdam Centraal Station to the main shopping street, the Kalverstraat. There we did some shopping, I was looking for jeans. Although ultimately I couldn't find a pair that I liked, it is a lot easier to find the right (tall) sizes in Holland for jeans than it is in the U.S. It was a regular Thursday morning so it wasn't very busy in the shops. It was great to walk around downtown Amsterdam; I really love this city.

The Centraal Station is Amsterdam has been under renovation for a few years now. It's a major overhaul of one of Holland's main public transportation hubs; a new bus terminal is being created as well as new underground metro station to connect to the planned new metro line in Amsterdam. Last time I was here was a year ago to meet Jelly, and it's nice to see the progress being made.

An old building facade, opposite the station.

Shops on the Damrak, the main street from the station to the central square.

Jaap & Mieke.

We spent most of the day in the Amsterdams Historisch Museum, the museum on Amsterdam's history. This is one of my favorite museums world-wide; not only because the subject is one I care about so much but it is a very well designed museum with a great selection. Later more (and lots of pictures) on this museum visit.