Amsterdaming

What does one do for one of their last weekends as a Londoner? Go to Amsterdam, of course. Actually, it was coincidental timing - the purpose of the trip was a huge surprise girls weekend for a friend of mine.

Though it was my fourth time in the city, I had never been there with a local (well, a transplanted Vancouverite, but she has adopted Amsterdam with a vengeance) and it made for a wonderful weekend. We wandered the entire city and I never had to pull out a map. We ducked into little cafes (no, not coffee shops) for the best espresso every half an hour, it seemed. That is, when we weren't sampling the wine list in various bars and restaurants. The best was the Dylan Hotel, a gorgeous little boutique hotel with a large, yet cozy fireplaced bar that we propped up for awhile. (And this week, The Guardian named it the "blow-out" hotel on their list of the best hotels in Amsterdam.)

The shopping was slightly out of control in Amsterdam - I'm obsessed with all the little boutiques with so many small European designers that I'm not familiar with. I love buying clothes that I know I'm not going to have staring back at me on some other girl walking down my street in London. The shopping created quite an appetite which we satisfied in a great North African restaurant, where food was consumed while lounging on pillows and smoking sheesha. I had my tarot cards read - my future card was "ruin" and my friend's was "defeat". This charming fortune telling episode led to hitting the bar after dinner, an old Amsterdam institution called Hoppe.

The flight home was delayed by hail, which pelted the plane as we sat on the runway, watching the pellets fill the window frame. My friend was sitting next to the window and remarked that it didn't look very good, to which I replied, pointing at myself and the friend on the other side of me, "Well, you are sitting next to defeat and ruin. Seatbelt fastened?"