I arrived at Grand Centraal in the afternoon of the 17th of June and made my way via tram to Surinamplien which is just south of Vondelpark and next to Rembrandt park (2 posts below), where I had organised to stay at Suzanne and Hans place who had found me on the internet. Suzanne is a writer who was a manager/coordinator for Townes Van Zandt a country/folk artist who died in '97 amongst other things and she had many a story to tell, we got along famously.
Hans' cafe was closed a year or so ago, so he had plenty of free time to give me the locals view of the city. We went on a couple of bike tours, and I got shown where the cheap food was, were the uber rich live, and where the best priced weed was. Which was at Katsu if you were wondering, away from the touristy places right next to the Albert Cuypstraat market which was open every day bar Sunday. I recommend the "Black Widow".

Where I was staying was so nice it was tough to leave, but I did manage to get my bearings by the end of the trip as I rode around for a good 3-4 hrs most days. Jordaan was beautiful, I took the photo above there (which still needs work) before stopping at a local wine store and picked up a bottle of Jenever which was the precursor to gin, I found it tastes awesome with apple juice or anything lime. Other Dutch favorites were Stamppot (kinda like sausage and mash with sauerkraut) which Hans made, and "Roomboter Honingstroopwafels" or crack cookies as I call them.

10 days was still not enough for Amsterdam, learning some basic Dutch will be key next time too. Now the countdown begins for Canada, I have a couple of photography related things going on before then, but will be trying to save a few more dinero before I leave.