We started the cruise with no incidents, thankfully! And this is a special cruise for the AMA Waterways line – the christening of the AmaLucia, the ship we are on! So, the owners are here, the children who are the “godparents” of the ship are here, lots of travel and food writers, you name it. And all the guests are treated like gods. Not bad!

Our first excursion, still in Amsterdam, is the Floriade, an ecological extravaganza that occurs every 10 years.

Of course, loads of flowers decorated everything, even though we are here in mid-Summer, rather than Spring, when the flowers are at their best. No tulips here now!

More interesting are the green displays, explaining how the people of Amsterdam are dealing with their water and pollution problems. Their difficulties are vastly different from those in Colorado; however, climate change is affecting them in a big way. Now, all the rain and snow water come down the river at almost the same time, with very little water flow the rest of the year. Many of the canals they have built are actually reservoirs for water storage, so the city has water year round.

The uses of plants, many to decrease the local temperatures in urban areas, are exciting to explore. These solutions are not easily transferable to Colorado, but the ideas could be adapted. Clare felt like she could have stayed at the Floriade extravaganza for days and not learned everything it has to offer.

The ship is new, with slight improvements from our trip 4 years ago on the Danube. Brian noticed spare propellers, and asked about them. Of course these are unique to the ship, and if one breaks, they need another immediately. The next one is our room. Cozy. And the restaurant is first class. The usual draft beer is Bitburger from from Bitburg in the Mosel River region of Germany.

Water, water everywhere! So many canals, and much of the area is below sea level. What I learned about Amsterdam is that these people are great engineers. They have universities devoted to water management; they know what they are doing.

Fortunately, our train was on schedule this time. The signs were much easier to figure out, and we felt comfortable in the city. So many of the buildings are tall.

Bicycles, bicycles everywhere. It was a bit dangerous being a pedestrian in Amsterdam. We had to pay attention to the color of the ground to see if we had the right of way or the bicycles did. Neither of us was run-over, fortunately.

An interesting observation about Amsterdam is that old churches, especially large ones, have been converted to shopping centers or performing arts centers. This makes sense when you realize that most of the dry “land” was reclaimed from the ocean or the many rivers that flow through the city, so buildings are precious.

Another thing to note is how open-minded the populous seems. The Embassy of the Free Mind was along a street we visited, and the condom store showed a colorful display. A cannabis-related store was next door. There are “coffee shops” in Amsterdam for marijuana products but we did not visit any.

Clare thought Brussels seemed tourist, especially English-speaking tourist, unfriendly. But perhaps that is because our “fast” train had to stop for 3.5 hours, the first hour of which was without air conditioning, because of protesters on the track. One of the other trains in front of us on the same track had much more trouble. So, Clare was hungry, tired and grumpy when we arrived in Brussels, just before midnight.

But the city center was quite lively at midnight, although finding a place with food (rather than just drink) was a bit of a problem. So many people enjoying the drizzling weather and the lovely lights. We found a Lebanese place serving “sandwiches” which were hot and delicious. The next day close to the same area, we realized that restaurants represented many different countries along that same street.

The signs in the train and metro stations were not translated into English, and also were not color-coded like in both France and Germany. It seemed some people spoke a little bit of English, but not enough to figure out our questions. So, we took a lot of time to figure out the transportation options.

We wandered around Brussels, through narrow streets with many shopfronts. We found monuments and gardens and fun displays (look at the one with the colorful hats). Brian found an Apple store, of course.

Mussels in Brussels and beer, oh my!

The Delirium Cafe (actually a bunch of small cafes, pubs and such serving over 2,000 different beers) was a fun destination. There we are, with a meter of beers to taste! And later we shared a pot of mussels.

The Musical Instrument Museum was fascinating and really well done. We were given ear phones and devices, and we wandered around looking at old and new musical instruments. Then, enter the number displayed on the instrument and you can hear just how it sounded. Old and new alike, each with its own personality. It was hard to leave that place!

A festival, “In the Streets,” was happening but we did not witness any performances. It was advertised on the streets where people would perform their street art. Or that’s what it seemed.

Other kinds of art decorated the streets as well.

Once we figured out the Metro system, we took a train to the edge of the city to see Atomium, a gigantic atomic crystal structure built for the 1958 world’s fair. You could get a ticket and go inside, but we decided against it (we did not have time). It was just fun to see crystallography on such a huge scale.

Joëlle said that the sky was crying this morning, because we were leaving our friends. It was true. It drizzled all the way from Aurélie’s apartment to our hotel in Paris, where Marc and Joëlle left us for their adventures in Southern France and Italy. It was difficult to part – the time with our friends went too quickly. We are lucky to have such great friends.

Visiting Paris, trying to see as much as possible in a small amount of time is a bit like “Whack-A-Mole”. You go to a Metro station, go underground and come up somewhere else. You look around a bit, then go another Metro station. That’s basically what we did in our short time in Paris.

The Hotel Camille is close to the Gare de Lyon train and metro stations; the next stop on the Metro is the Bastille monument. The elevator in the hotel is tiny, with a door that one has to push open. The final day of the Tour de France bicycle race was the next day; we saw the grandstands and decorations along the Champ-Élysées as we walked toward the Louvre.

We tried to see the famous places that Brian has never visited, although Clare saw them when she was here with her mother in 2007.

The Metro line we rode the most was fully automated and often very crowded. The Paris city hall (Hotel de Ville) is a fancy building; the Olympics are coming to Paris in 2024.

The many pyramids at the Louvre provide an interesting contrast to the older museum buildings.

Of course we walked along the Seine River and saw Norte Dame, which is being reconstructed after the devastating fire a couple of years ago.

We decided to find the very old house (built in 1407) that belonged to Nicolas Flamel, a scribe and alchemist whose work was mentioned in the Harry Potter books. Along the way we found colorful umbrellas at a sidewalk cafe and the colorful pipes on the outside of the Pompidou Center.

Luxembourg Gardens is near the university area where Brian’s father studied in the 1950s.

Brian hiked up Montmarte hill to see the Basilica of the Sacred Heart (Sacré Coeur) while Clare stayed at the cafe where we had lunch. This was close to Gare de Nord, our departure station to Brussels in the evening.