I've Been There

Another hip shot.  Actually, I've walked by there several times but have not actually been in it. Not really my kind of place.  

We can figure out the sticker to the left. Check. I think the one on the right is Paris. Check.  The lower right has to be Wales. Check. The flag just below the buckle is that of the City of St. Louis. Well, obviously. There is still an awful lot on the list.   

An Unusual Restaurant (And CDP Meetup)

Hello from Bremen, Germany. Why, you might ask? Because Mrs. C comes from the outskirts of this version of Bremen. All of her great-grandparents came from the region around here. We'll do some poking around into that over the next couple of days.

Last night we met and had a fabulous dinner with Stef and his wife, Marianne, of S.C Collections, our Amsterdam City Daily Photo sister blog. They took us to a pop-up restaurant, Baut & Dreesmann, in an out-of-business department store. The restaurant and, I assume the link, will be there for just a few more weeks. Very urban hip and the food was fabulous. Below we have a strip of mackerel with tiny radishes; duck, exotic mushrooms, bok choy and I don't know what; and a three-masted ship from heaven. The kitchen staff were very intense. 

The toilets we up one floor. I'd bet a euro that they hired James Rosenquist to do the walls. The last picture has the Dutch word for a store's fitting rooms interposed with a big red L for loo, or something like that. Note the rolls of toilet paper under the sign.       

Amsterdam Scenes

Just a few images. We were out late last night at a fabulous production of Mozart's Marriage of Figaro at the National Opera and need to get on the street here Friday morning.

The first shot is of the Amstel River, part of the canal system, taken from the balcony of the opera house. The second is a little footbridge across the Singel canal from the Rijksmuseum. The last is a billboard on the side of the Van Gogh Museum advertising the current show.

Dinner with S.C. and his wife. Into Germany tomorrow.    

Well, It's Worse At The Louvre

People per square meter of painting, da Vinci's Mona Lisa at the Louvre is way worse. Still, Rembrandt's The Night Watch is what draws the crowds at Amsterdam's Rijksmuseum, one of the world's greatest. The crowds in the rest of the place were quite manageable.

Just outside the entrance, two people on accordion and tuba were playing the Bach Toccata and Fugue in D Minor. They kicked butt. If you were down the street you might have thought an orchestra was awaiting you.

A few blocks further on, Vincent was hoping for some tea and sympathy.

Busy day today, ending with a performance of Le Nozze Di Figaro at the Netherlands National Opera.             

Arrival

What a day. Middle flight two hours late. Barely made the connection and the airline lost one of our bags. (It's been found but not delivered yet.) Turns out I needed medical attention. Weird, but taken care of. And then wind farms in the sea, followed by incomprehensible pizza boxes and fashion. Maybe after a good night's sleep...