Proost!

Before we begin, I forgot one key learning from yesterday... There was a profession known as the 'piss profits' who claimed to determine all that ails you by examining your urine. Lucky for us they were discredited by the 17th century, but how did this ever come into fashion in the first place...

Moving right along then. We started off this morning at the Van Gogh Museum and I discovered I am a big fan of Odilon Redon lithographs housed in the museum, especially the very science fiction-esque "As In a Dream" series. In short, Van Gogh was passionate, talented and tragic. Very interesting to see the chronological progression of his works aligned with his life experiences.

Next we headed off to the Heinekin Experience, where you see me in rare form with an actual *gasp* beer in my hand. Gwen is not a beer drinker, and try as they might, the good folks at Heinekin were unable to change this. We did go on a little 'brew you' ride where they 'bottled' us and we got to taste beer ingredients in their pure form, wort form and as a finished product.

We settled in to a canal cruise and learned about the building of the canals and the bridges throughout the city. The evening breeze started to cool off as we finished our ride and headed for the Anne Frank house.

That was truely an amazing place to see, to try to understand what it must have been like to live in this hidden place with eight people and no chance to ever see the sun. I am always moved by small glimpses into Europe during WWII and her short life is tragic and touching - you can feel her presence in each of the rooms.

Tomorrow morning we bid Amsterdam farefell and fly off to Athens for the next leg of our journey. More then!