Alice Adores Amsterdam Part 1: Arrival & Apartment Tour

Oh heeeey! Welcome back to Alice Adores Apparel! How are you? I hope you are well.

So as you may or may not know, I recently relocated to Amsterdam for 3 months. I have been given an incredible opportunity to train at the Cisco European Headquarters and I couldn't be happier! Because this city is such an amazing, vibrant place, I wanted to share with you as much of my time here as possible. With that I mind, I'm starting this new blog series, Alice Adores Amsterdam, about all my adventures. Hopefully I can inspire you, when you're next in this beautiful city, to check out any of the facinating places I mention. Plus, please recommend in the comments below any places you like in Amsterdam. I'd love to check them out.

Our Amsterdam adventure started on the 24th January, when a set of four very bleary eyed ONI employees jetted off to Amsterdam from Luton. I got to the airport earlier than the three boys, so decided to get a manicure while I waited for them after security haha! Flying with EasyJet was pretty stress free and the flight was only around an hour. Within no time we were in a taxi on our way to the apartment. Things then got weird... Our taxi driver proceeded to inform us about his three way relationship with his two girlfriends. Very liberal, slightly unusual, but not shocking. However, he then started to go into pretty graphic detail, openly sharing very intimate photos from his phone, of his two girlfriends in highly compromising positions. This was an incredibly strange welcome to Amsterdam, but it certainly lived up to the city's wild reputation.

For this first Amsterdam post I wanted to give you a quick tour of the amazing apartment my company have kindly provided for my stay. It's located near Vondelpark, in Amsterdam's Museum Quarter. Living here, we are a short walk from The Van Gough Museum and the Rijksmuseum. The houses around here are beautiful and there is a really chic vibe. It's quite an expensive area, which has its pros and cons, but it also feels incredibly safe. Public transport, like everywhere in Amsterdam, is frequent and generally easy. With the OV-chipkaart transport card you can access the city's tram, bus, and train services, to get pretty much anywhere. It works in a similar way to London's Oyster card. Plus Amsterdam is a great city to walk through, so strolling around is a pleasure.

The apartment consists of an open-plan living-kitchen-dining area, two bedrooms, a bathroom and a loo. Up on the roof we have a huge terrace, which would be perfect for hosting parties on, but unfortunately the temperature is way too cold at the moment. We also have two balconies, one off the dining area, and one off my bedroom. What with the daily snow and icy wind, we haven't been able to take much advantage of either.

The apartment is very modern and chic. It definitely reflects Dutch contemporary interior design. I love all the details the landlord has added, because it gives the place character. The estate agents seems to be pretty impressed I could recognise the pixilated wall piece of the Girl with a Pearl Earring by Vermeer (I was pretty darn proud too!)

I love my bedroom. The bed is super comfy, the decor is chic. But most importantly there is ample wardrobe space! I just wish I could use the balcony more often.

Our rooftop terrace has so much space. It's just a same we aren't using it at the moment. There are, however, some beautiful views of the surrounding area.

That's all for now from Amsterdam. Be sure to keep checking back to read the next instalment of my adventure as soon as it's posted.

Please leave a comment with any suggestions of exciting things to do in Amsterdam.

Thanks for checking out my blog.
Until next time!
X