Earlier this year we decided we wanted to visit Amsterdam and booked to go in October half-term. Our diary was written at the time but only just getting around to posting them up on the blog now...
Written on Monday 24th October
We'd quite randomly decided on a trip to Amsterdam earlier
in the year, before our trip to Wales, and before our trip of a lifetime to Dubai came about. Having wanted to visit the Miffy museum in nearby Utrecht and
finding great value easyjet flights, Amsterdam it was.
I'd booked accommodation rather randomly by finding
somewhere online and thinking that'll do.
So yesterday we headed off from home to Southend airport
feeling quite pleased with ourselves. Choosing to fly from Southend meant we'd
cheated the traffic we'd usually face when flying from Gatwick. The
park and ride airport parking was also a fraction of the price we normally pay
for airport parking. Queues to get through security were non-existent as it is
such a small and relatively quiet airport.
So there we were feeling very pleased that we had found a
great airport for short-haul flights, when the smugness quickly got wiped away
when the entire airport had completely run out of food! It seemed the most
ridiculous situation - were we snowed in? No. Was this some war-torn country
where supplies couldn't get through? No. Had there been some other epidemic or
crisis affecting this part of the country. No. How and why was there no food available????!!! It was a mystery that we never found the answer to.
So we were left with 3 hungry children and having found both
the eateries out of food, we were left with the final tuna and cucumber
sandwich left on the (rather empty) shelves of WHSMITH. To share between the 5
of us.
All wasn't lost, or so we thought, we'd just wait for our flight and buy a
sandwich on board. I remember from our flight to Paris last year that there was
a selection of sandwiches, baguettes and that sort of thing available - Little did we know...
Absolutely could not believe our eyes when Easyjet came
round with the snacks trolley and they too had run out of food! What was going
on!
The flight is really short and we landed to a beautiful
sunny October day in Amsterdam.
We actually experienced a bit of an adventure right there in Schipol airport but I shall keep that as a party piece story to tell of another
time.
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| Evidence of Miffy all around - spotted this balloon at the airport |
We love the challenge of finding our own way around in a new
place so train tickets totalling a bargain 17.50 euro got us from the airport
to our closest train stop to the hotel. A short walk later and we found
ourselves at the Westcord Fashion Hotel.
At this point I could finally feel smug as the hotel had the
wow factor and our rooms were stunning. Very stylish and
contemporary. We unpacked (didn't take long as we travelled hand luggage
only) and then ate our dinner at the bar part of the restaurant downstairs.
It was quiet and relaxed. Although the surroundings do
lend themselves to special occasions and dressing up, we had checked with
reception whether we were OK with jeans and trainers as we hadn't packed any
formal clothes at all and that was absolutely fine with them.
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| rather strange yet 'arty' fashion decor at Westcord Fashion Hotel |
Desserts were just as amazing with J choosing the 'Structure
of chocolate', Daddy having the molten chocolate pudding, D with Dutch
apple cake , and Miss T homemade strawberry and vanilla icecream.
These were the doors of the male and female toilets in the hotel. Strange but true!
We'd hoped to squeeze in a swim in the hotel pool but we were
all too tired and it was getting late so it was off to bed.
Other posts in this series:
Autumn in Amsterdam - Day 1 (this post)
Autumn in Amsterdam - Day 2Other posts in this series:
Autumn in Amsterdam - Day 1 (this post)
Autumn in Amsterdam - Day 3
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