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Hello, and welcome to a special episode of the Elevated Edit podcast.

I have a special guest with me today.

My name is Jessica Frankus.

Sorry.

We've been traveling for how many days now?

I guess we have about three, so about 12 day 12 or 13 day.

12 in Europe, and that is actually what this episode is about.

So.

So we're gonna do an episode for each country, and we're gonna start with Amsterdam.

That was the first country that we visited.

And we're gonna talk about what we expected, what actually happened, and what we would do differently and just different things that we liked about each country.

So we're gonna start with Amsterdam.

Amsterdam was rough on us.

It was pretty rough physically.

First, let's talk about the flight first, what we were expecting and what was okay.

I mean, the flight to me was not bad.

Yeah, it was kind of an overnight flight for us, but I was able to sleep quite a bit.

We were definitely.

We can't afford first class internationally yet, but if you can, I would say internationally would definitely be worth it.

I would say if eight hours or more definitely need.

Yeah, like, more room.

I was starting to get a little antsy towards the end because, like, my legs were hurting and you couldn't really spread out at all.

But they served us food on the plane.

I thought it was great.

They served us, I guess with our time difference.

They served us dinner, and then they served us breakfast.

But overall, overall, it was great.

The big plane was great.

There wasn't any turbulence, really.

Overall, it.

It.

The flight went way better than I expected.

Yeah.

And then we got to Amsterdam and we struggled a little bit with transportation.

That is one thing that I would recommend is don't try to figure out the transportation when you first get there and you have all your luggage with you.

Like, spring for an Uber.

Just.

Yeah, go ahead and pay extra.

Get an Uber, get situated, and then try to figure out the Metro and stuff.

Yeah.

And usually the airport is far away from where either the center of town or, you know, where your hotel is.

Yeah, just.

We have a check in.

Oh, yeah, we had a train.

We struggled at first because our bags are way too freaking Heavy.

We couldn't get them on the train.

Luckily this guy helped us because the conductor was blowing his whistle at us and it was.

It was really stressful.

But anyway, we eventually got to our hotel.

Our hotel in Amsterdam was fantastic.

It was in a great location, I thought.

Yeah.

Yeah, it's pretty much in the center of town.

Amsterdam was great.

I was expecting it.

It was about what I expected to be.

Honestly.

I thought so, too.

Definitely a lot more bikes than I thought.

I've always heard it's the city of bikes.

And I knew there would be a lot of bikes, but, I mean, there are a lot of bikes.

But we were able to walk everywhere.

Pretty much.

You could take the metro.

It's.

It's.

Yeah, it was a very walkable town.

Like I would say, I think in Amsterdam we visited like all the places that I wanted to visit there and we were able to walk everywhere.

Like, we only we didn't get on.

Was there a metro?

There's just a bus and a train.

The metro was like.

It was on the street, but it was a subway.

Yeah.

But I'd say we got on, what, twice?

Yeah, we pretty much walked over.

Yeah.

Now we did get sick.

Both of us got sick.

He did get sick.

I had just like a sinus.

My throat was killing me.

Jess.

I didn't realize she was as sick as she was.

I would probably would have stressed out if I'd have known.

Yeah, I thought I had a stomach ulcer at one point.

I had such bad indigestion.

And I don't know if that was from something we ate or maybe the amount of alcohol.

Yeah.

The day before, it just would jet lag and everything else.

But went to the pharmacy and got some medicine and I was.

I was okay the day after.

But yeah, easy.

Didn't help that the last meal I ate before I got really sick was eel.

Yeah, pretty much raw eel.

So that was all I could taste.

And think of that day was a.

So we booked a day trip.

What was that town called that we went to?

Zan.

Zan.

Hold on, we're looking it up.

N S.

And then was it S, C, H, A, N, S, however you pronounce that, the we.

So we booked it through, like a company.

And our guide was Sam.

And he was absolutely fantastic.

He picked us up in this really nice van, like drove us out to the countryside and we basically spent the majority of the day with him.

I think he picked us up at what, like nine?

And he dropped us off at 2:30ish.

Yeah.

And it Was great.

Yeah, I would highly recommend that.

Fantastic.

We went and saw windmills.

We went to the church cheese factory.

He took us to lunch.

He took us to this little, like, seaside town thing, and we got to do some shopping and stuff.

I kind of felt bad that we both felt so bad because I think we were, like, low energy.

Like, we fell asleep on the way back.

I feel like I asked him a lot of questions on the way there.

Yeah, he was super informative.

Like, he was very entertaining.

And I thought.

I thought I learned a lot about Amsterdam from him that, like, I probably wouldn't have learned otherwise.

Okay, so we talked about what else in Amsterdam.

Did we.

Fun fact about Amsterdam.

Their king really has no power in their government, but makes about 10 million a year and does not pay.

Yeah, I forgot about that.

Yeah, I thought that was pretty.

Yeah, that was another fun fact that we learned from Sam.

The weather.

I thought it was a little chilly.

It was a little.

I was expecting it to be a lot rainier, but it wasn't all that bad.

It sprinkled a little bit and then it rained for, like, hard for, like, maybe an hour that one day.

But that was really about it.

So, yeah, it was super nice.

Everybody was super nice.

I didn't think the language barrier was that bad.

Everybody, like, as long as you made an effort.

I thought everybody was very accommodating, very polite.

I don't think their manners were, like.

They weren't like, over the top bubbly.

Like, we definitely kind of stood out as Americans in that sense.

But they were very nice, very polite.

For sure.

For sure.

Trying to think of what else stood out in Amsterdam.

Just giving some information here on our stay if you are planning to go to Amsterdam.

Our hotel was called the NH Collection in the Flower Market district.

So, yeah, and it was a great hotel.

Like, it was very walkable.

I felt super safe.

Like, when Jess wasn't feeling good, I went and ate dinner by myself one night and I didn't feel uncomfortable at all.

You've got to get a.

Oh, let's talk about food.

We didn't.

We haven't talked about food yet.

The Stroop waffles.

We got one of those.

Jess liked it.

It was a little too sweet for me.

Yeah.

Ole Bowlin.

I wanted the olive, which is like a donut, essentially their type of donut.

But I wanted one from one of the street vendors and we ended up not being able to find it.

I think it was too late in the day at that point.

It was like the last day.

Another Thing is the bitter ballin.

It's like.

I almost want to describe it as like a boudin ball.

That's not that.

It's just like fry.

It's like a meat inside, but it's a fried ball.

Yeah.

And they have different ones, too.

Yeah, they have different ones, but that was really good.

We tried that the first day.

What else did we eat?

You got that cookie croissant.

Oh, yeah.

A crookie.

A crookie.

That was really good.

It was from Lorenz or Lauren's.

I want to say it's like.

It's all over TikTok.

You can look it up.

But that was.

If you like croissants, you'd really like that.

Jess doesn't really like croissants, but I loved it.

It literally is like a big fat croissant and it's got three chocolate chip cookies cooked into it.

Like it's.

It's a fat treat, but it's so good.

Some other aesthetically pleasing places.

We ate the Siren.

It was more maybe like fish and.

Yep.

Kind of Mediterranean vibe.

Very fresh, very good.

The Secret Garden.

Very aesthetically pleasing.

Cute place.

We got some really good.

Did we get sea bass there?

We did.

And then we had.

What was that thing wrapped in avocado?

Oh, yeah, it was sauce on it.

It was probably the best thing I've ever eaten.

Yeah, that was really good.

So again, maybe kind of similar vibes, but it was really cute.

And then we sat at their bar after, enjoyed a little bit and they.

Had drinks, and then we should have stopped, and then we didn't.

But hey, you know what?

We had fun.

I got sick after that.

But that's okay.

It's okay.

We had fun.

That's what you're supposed to do in a foreign country.

Right?

Oh, and then the Sea Palace.

Oh, my gosh.

That was a big Chinese place.

So we didn't even plan to go to the Sea Palace.

We were actually walking to another place and then.

But the Sea palace is, like, on the water.

And what did that.

What did that tour guide say about the Sea palace then when they built it?

Because it's like a.

It sank.

Yeah.

Because they originally had the same design as in Japan or in China.

And the people in.

Well, just.

I want to.

I want to say it's China.

The people in China are so much smaller than the people in the Netherlands were.

And they built it structurally to hold people in China.

And the people in the Netherlands were so big, they literally sunk the building the first day that they opened.

But they Rebuilt it.

And so anyway, we went in there and it was.

So it's probably been one of my top favorite meals.

Good.

There were these noodles that we ordered, and they were like, thick, fat, soft, like egg noodles.

It was so good.

And it's on the river, so it's really pretty.

That was delicious.

It kind of reminds me of a casino boat.

Yeah.

But it's really pretty inside.

Yeah, it was so good.

That was.

That's.

That was honestly probably one of my favorite places we've eaten.

And then there's this other place called Adam.

Adam A.

Yeah, the tower.

Like this.

It's where they have those swings on top of this huge tower.

And you could do the swings.

We did not do the swings.

We just went.

Ate dinner up there and did the lookout.

Dinner was not worth.

Yeah, the food was all right.

The food was giving Applebee's.

I thought, like, it was kind of like Amsterdam's version of Applebee's.

Yeah, it's.

It's.

The food was all right.

Nothing to write home about.

There's.

I would go to the tower, but I would eat dinner somewhere else.

Yeah.

What else?

There's lots of canals everywhere, lots of flowers.

It's very beautiful.

I know what you're asking.

Did we go to the red light district?

Yes, we did.

Yes, we did.

Twice.

It's.

It honestly wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be.

What do you mean bad?

Like, I don't know.

I just kind of figured the red light district was going to be a little unsafe.

And it wasn't.

Yeah.

Nobody was really.

Nobody cared about us as we were walking.

Also.

Were there pretty early.

We were there very early.

So that is one thing we've learned in Europe is that they don't get started.

Like, they don't crank things up until like, 8:30.

No.

And we were there.

Yeah, we were there at, like.

We literally were, like, trying to hang out until the sun went down.

Do not even open until like, 7.

7:30.

Yeah.

Like, do not open their doors.

Like, we've made reservations thinking that we, like, got in, like, in hot places.

You're like, oh, we got a 7:30 reservation.

That's literally the first.

And you're, like, the only person sitting there.

And it's like, oh, that's why we got a reservation, because we're freaking losers.

This only time we could get in here.

Let's see what else about Amsterdam?

I think that was really.

It.

It was great.

It was really cute.

Super cute.

Really welcoming.

Very welcoming.

I would bring kids there There were a lot of kids.

There were a lot of kids really safe.

Like, I would have gone there alone and for sure.

And I.

I would like, if I ever.

For y'all listening, don't be like, oh, I think she's gonna have a kid now.

Maybe not.

But if I ever did have kids, I would want to take them to Amsterdam so that they could see how independent the Dutch children were.

Because, like, the kids were just running around by themselves.

Like they were crossing the street and going to school, riding their bikes all over town.

Like, it was a very, like, community oriented, very independent minded community.

So I would definitely want my kids to experience that.

And I did.

I did get a bike and ride it around.

She did.

Blakely knew her limits.

She did not.

And we will talk about that.

We'll talk about.

We'll talk about my limits when it comes to bikes in the next episode.

Because I think Jessica doubted me for a second and then she learned real quick, oh, Blakely really does not know how to ride a bike.

She wasn't just making it up.

Yeah, that's.

That's a conversation for the next episode.

Okay, I think we've rambled on about Amsterdam enough.

I highly recommend it.

If you have any other questions, you probably know how to reach us.

If not, you can just reach out on the Elevated Edit socials and be happy to answer.

But yeah, that was it.

All right.

I think that was a good episode for the people.

If y'all have any other questions, just let us know.

Okay, we'll see y'all later.

Ciao.

Bye.

Tatzines.

Tatzines, tutzines.

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