#HardRockCafe

North to Amsterdam
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North to Amsterdam

October dawned as another early day on Saturday, October 1st as we were up early to make the 15 or so minute walk to the RER (Réseau Express Régional’ or Regional Express Railway) station at Cité Universitaire to make another visit to Gare de Nord. Today’s destination is to be Amsterdam. (I still got to go there after all.) I loved having reliable and rapid transit to use in Paris. It was only a 1 ticket ride to Gare de Nord so it cost less than 2 Euros 1 way; a lot less than the 27 Euro cab ride last time. (And much less than our gypsy cab ride back.) and no more time than taking a taxi.

Unlike our last train trip; this time we weren’t leaving the EU so we just had to go through security and not passport control.

We were about an hour before the train was scheduled to leave and we checked out the train station a little and got some food to take on the train.

Soon our train pulled up and I took my camera out to get a photo or two.

I was concerned to have a rather serious looking security guard come over to me and tell me there are no photographs allowed in the building. Now normally I’m a sarcastic smart ass and would of pointed out that everybody and their dog has a cell phone to take photos with; but not being nearly as dumb as I look; I just said I was disappointed in hearing that as it’s such a beautiful old building and I would adhere to that.

It was just over a three hour trip from Gare de Nord to the Amsterdam Centraal station with quick stops in Brussels, Antwerp, Rotterdam and the Amsterdam airport. We never got off the train at those stops but I’m counting it as visiting Belgium, lol.

It was about a 15 minute walk and even though it was only just noon, we stopped at our hotel; Hotel Pagi to see if we could check in early to keep us from dragging our luggage around. Luckily, they let us check in. Curtis and Lucille’s room wasn’t ready so we put all the stuff in our room and headed out to look for food.

This being the Moffat’s 4 trip to Amsterdam, Curtis has mapped out a plan for food.

We meandered for just over a kilometer as we made our way south toward our lunch stop; De Carrousel Pannenkoeken.

I had heard nothing but great things about the mini Dutch pancakes so it only seemed appropriate to have them as our first meal in Amsterdam.

I had the cherries with mine. I love cherries and they are never an option on the breakfast menu so it only seemed natural.

And I must say, they were fabulous.

We started walking across the canal over towards the Heineken Experience to see what we could find from there.

I loved the architecture I saw along the way and took photos of what seemed like everything.

Soon though we found ourselves at Albert Cuypmarkt; Iconic street market since 1905 with lots of stands selling clothing, local foods, flowers & more.

It looked a lot cooler than our local market so we decided to check it out.

Lynda and Lucille found a few things to purchase (big surprise) and then we came to a stall/store that caught both their eyes.

Lynda deciding on a colour.

I’m not much of a sandal wearer but the pricing was very good so I bought Lynda a pair she liked.

Since we now had things to carry; that was enough shopping for now and we started walking over to the Hard Rock Cafe just over a kilometer away to see about getting Curtis a shot glass. (And a drink or two for us.)

It took us over half an hour to make our way to the Hard Rock as I had to point my camera at a thing or 10 along the way.

There were no shot glasses for sale in Amsterdam but we decided to have a drink while we were here.

Lucille and Lynda wanted a lemon drop shot and the 3 of us shared a large strawberry margarita.

It was getting close to supper time so we started back to our hotel to drop off the shopping bags.

We dropped off the shopping and Curtis moved their stuff up to their room before we headed out for supper.

We’d walked just over 1/2 back towards the train station when we got to our destination; Gandhi Restaurant.

Curtis has travelled quite extensively and had told me that the best Indian food he’s had outside of India was in Amsterdam. I love Indian food so this was my whole reason to make the trip to the city.

I must say, he wasn’t wrong as far as I can tell. (I haven’t been to India but it was the best Indian food I’ve ever had.)

We had to walk that fabulous meal off so we headed out to check out Amsterdam at night.

I couldn’t decide what was cooler; a parking garage for bicycles or the fact there were 1156 spaces available for bikes.
Another parking garage for bicycles.

Apparently we did get over to the red light district. I wasn’t paying much attention as I just took photos of everything.

We made our way back to the hotel and I took a last couple of photos from Curtis and Lucille’s room. They faced the main street where we faced a side alley.

Considering we’d spent about 4 hours travelling today it was quite surprising to get just over 20 thousand steps in.

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Tenerife, Day 3

Woke up to lots and lots of rain on Saturday, September 24th.

Apparently our rough seas on the ferry crossing yesterday was the first signs of Tropical Storm Hermine as it approached the islands.

We headed out to Lizzie’s Bistro for breakfast and as we pulled up I got a Facebook notice that they would be closed due to the weather.

We had to go in search of plan B. We didn’t know many places yet so we drove around to see what looked open.

We soon found Sweet Franks. It had a covered patio and promised the best breakfast so we though we’d give it a try.

It was quite a good breakfast and we got some tea for the road as we went off in search of more shot glasses for Curtis at The Hard Rock Hotel on the west side of the island.

It was a fairly high falutin place but they didn’t have any shot glasses.

We decided to make our way to the Rock Shop area.

We ended up across the road at Centro Comercial Safari shopping centre. It’s a nice shopping mall with a a bunch of restaurants on the 2nd level.

All the restaurants looked good and we decided on Hacienda Miranda for lunch.

It was the first Mexican restaurant we had tried on our trip and it was very, very good. The food was fabulous and they made the best strawberry margarita I have ever gotten in a restaurant or bar, anywhere.

To avoid a food coma, we walke across the street to The Rock Shop. Not only did they not have any shot glasses, the clerk was a bit pissy about us bringing wet umbrellas into the shop. (How dare we use them in all that rain.) They didn’t have a spot by the door for them and it’s not like anyone was waving them around, but Lucille did shake out her poncho afterwards.

We re-crossed the street to check out the shopping mall and after a bit of window shopping, were ready to head back to the apartments.

The rain had been varying from misty to pouring rain all day but we still decided to walk over to the grocery store for some tea and other stuff.

Roadside sculpture

It was raining intermittently when we went out for supper but we walked over to Bistró 431, which is in the lower level of the building Sweet Franks is.

Since our lunch had been so big, no one was overly hungry so we just got some Tapas. The food was good but it wasn’t on the same level as lunch had been so it seemed a bit disappointing at the time. (Even though it really wasn’t disappointing at all.)

The plates were super cool

We headed back to the apartments drinks and snacks we had gotten at the grocery store earlier. (I know we had just eaten but there wasn’t much to do in the rain.)

The weather wasn’t looking any better as darkness approached.

Even though it wasn’t cold out, (at least not by Canadian standards) the pool was closed, as it had been all day.

Even with the weather as it was, we managed to get just over 12 thousand steps in today. Not bad all in all. Hopefully, tomorrow will dawn with better weather.

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Canary Islands; day 2

I was going to title this post as Tenerife; Day 2 but we were up well before the crack of dawn on Friday, September 23rd, to drive north to Santa Cruz de Tenerife to catch the ferry to go to Las Palmas de Gran Canaria in search of Hard Rock Cafe shot glasses and beaches.

My brother in law, Curtis, collects the shot glasses from Hard Rock Cafes and Hotels from all the places he’s visited around the world (and he’s visited a lot of places) but he’d never been to the Canary Islands and the opportunity to visit another island nearby was just too tempting not to go.

Seems so calm out there

We had just cleared the entrance to the harbour when it became obvious that it was rougher than it looked out there on the open sea.

The ferry seemed like it was just crawling along and it was pitching and bouncing so walking was a challenge. The crew made it look easy but looking for chairs to grab or a wall to lean on was the only way I could get around easily.

It’s faster than it feels

It seemed less rough at the back of the boat so I stayed on the deck for a bit and took a few shots. Lynda made her way back there for a while too.

She’s smiling now

Our trip over was about 2 and a half hours. We could of taken a 2 hour trip to a different port but it would of involved more driving to where we needed to go. I’m sure with the rough ride, Curtis was re-thinking the port choice.

Ferry going the other way
Hard to keep a level horizon

It had been pretty cloudy on the way over but as we drove to the south side of the island to find the Hard Rock Cafe Rock Shop Gran Canaria the clouds started parting.

At least the sun was shining when we got to the shopping centre as The Rock Shop was closed. We walked around the area checking out stores hoping it would open soon. We’ll take the credit for that working.

After the wait, we found out they are out of shot glasses and suggested going to the Hard Rock Hotel to find some.

I did get myself a tee shirt so at least it wasn’t a total waste of time.

We decided to get some lunch while we were there.

The food was fabulous and I really enjoyed the Tapas.

The bathroom tile was pretty cool

With lunch over, it was time to walk over to the beach.

So many nice flowers growing everywhere

At last, the beach came into view.

I’m not much of a beach guy so I’ve not been to too many of them but even I can recognize a nice beach when I see it. And this was a nice beach.

It was such nice sand to walk on. The black mixed in made the sand patterns change constantly as the water washed over it.

The water seemed cool initially but as I walked along it felt warm. Since I had my camera and was carrying all our stuff, going knee deep was as far as I could go. My bride, on the other hand, had no such restrictions having given me everything but her sandals to carry.

A lack of swimsuit wouldn’t deter my bride from getting a feel for the ocean. Even her hat was wet, but she was enjoying herself.

We started making our way back to the car so we could head over to The Hard Rock Hotel to look for shot glasses there.

It was a short drive east to the hotel and we found a parking spot only a short walk away.

After learning there were no shot glasses here either, we sat and enjoyed a drink before going to check out the nearby beach.

It was a short walk through some sand dunes to another fabulous beach.

I saw why Gran Canaria is noted for it’s beaches. I’ve only been to 2 of them so far and both have been really nice.

I was once again limited to knee depth but my wife and sister had no such restrictions. They figured they were already wet so maybe some body surfing was in order. They never did manage to get the surfing part down but they did manage to get even wetter than they already were.

I was in the ocean too.

It was getting time to go look for some food before we had to catch the ferry back so we walked along the restaurants near the back and decided on Pub Dragon.

We tried a few more Tapas and Curtis had a hotdog.

It was a nice, short walk back to the car.

I saw quite a few cool things along the way but it’s really hard to take photos out the back of a car so you’ll just have to take my word for it.

We got back to the ferry terminal with time to spare and waited patiently for it to come. And waited, and waited.

Finally a ferry pulled in. It wasn’t the company we had come over with and it was an older ship. It looked to be a downgrade from the morning boat.

Finally we were under way.

Just like the mornings trip, the moment we left the harbour it was a rough ride. It was actually rougher than in the morning. (The tropical depression that arrives tomorrow probably had something to do with it.) I’m sure being pitch dark out probably didn’t help the feeling of how rough the crossing was.

We got back to Santa Cruz de Tenerife around 11:00 pm and made our way back to the apartments.

I’m sure there is some cool stuff to see between there and the Costa del Silencio area but both directions of travel on that trip was in the dark so I really have no idea if there is or not.

Our really long day was over around midnight as we got back to the apartment. Just shy of 12k steps today, a lot of them at/near the beach. It was a good day, ferry rides aside.