Mindy and I just got back from an adventure that took us to New Jersey, Amsterdam and Belgium. The Amsterdam and Belgium part was a river cruise we booked with FI Friends Travel, run by my friend, Kristen. Here was the itineray:

New Jersey Beach (3/26-3/29): First, we stopped to visit my good friend, Bob. Four other friends joined joined us at the Airbnb. The weather was cold, but the beaches were amazing.

Urecht (3/30-4/2): This was a pre-cruise adventure planned by my friends, Jolene and Darren from Dare to Draw Down.

FI Friends Travel River Cruise (4/2-4/9): And finally, the main event.

Random Thoughts: River Cruising, Netherlands, And Friendly Travel

River Cruise

A river cruise is much different from the big ship version. On a big ship, much of the experience is the boat itself; pools, waterslides, go-carts, zip lines, musicals, restaurants, on and on. A river cruise is much more sedate. The attractions are the cities that it stops in. The experience onboard was still fun, but on a much smaller scale with less options.

Watching the world go by from the ship was really good. On a big ship, you’re either docked or in the middle of the sea. On a river cruise, you can always see land. Watching the world go by as the sun goes down was very nice.

This cruise company (Avalon) fit my style. I overheard another passenger lamenting that one of the other river cruise lines had better food and passengers who dressed up. The food was good and the last thing I want to do on a vacation (or pretty much ever) is wear fancy clothes. Taco Bell*/Costco Casual for the win!

*The food was better than Taco Bell.

The guided tours were great. Avalon offered excursions, many of which were free. The free excursions were usually guided tours around the city. These were staffed by locals who did a great job.

Boat Versus Ship. When talking to the crew, I learned NOT to call the big floating thing a boat. Workers on the SHIP get angry if you call it a “boat.”

Netherlands and Belgium

The cities have an eclectic mix of old and new architecture, sometimes simultaneously.

Stunning cathedrals built 500 years ago.

Structures hundreds of years old with modern addtions.

A home in Utrecht that was built in 1924, but looks like it could have been built this year.

This one in Rotterdam reminded me of one of the spaceships from the Dune movies.

And whomever designed this one may have been under the influence of one of substances that Amsterdam is famous for legalizing!

The public transportation was spectacular. Even small towns had modern trains. Seeing this one in Ghent roll up in front of a castle amused me.

The Dutch are industrious people. I admit that prior to this trip, my knowledge of the Netherlands didn’t go much beyond dykes, windmills, and stroopwafels. Reclaiming 2,700+ square miles of land by use of windmills, canals, and dykes would be a monumental engineering achievement today. The Dutch did much of it in the 1600s! I’m not surprised that they build miraculous machines today.

Bike culture. It’s pretty great that so many use bicycles as a primary source of transportation. I saw:

• Children being transported in various ways; in seats mounted behind the handlebars, in a basket on the handlebars, and in a variety of cargo eBikes.
• One adult transporting another adult in a cargo bike. The guy being transported may or may not have been drunk.
• Families biking to school.

For the pedestrian, Amsterdam was slightly treacherous. Bikes have precedence over all other forms of transportation. And probably pretty much everything and anything else. Cyclists stop for no one. DO NOT STAND IN THE BIKE LANE!

The cars amused me. I knew I’d see a lot of electric vehicles (EVs) in the Netherlands. I didn’t expect to see all of the miniature EVs. I especially liked the 3 wheeled Carver that leans like a motorcycle when turning (bottom left below).

Bathrooms are difficult, but now you can tap-to-pee. It’s hard to find a place to go pee. It felt equivalent to NYC. Toilets are few and far between.

But one really neat thing is that public toilets now take credit cards. A quick tap and you’re *in*. This was a vast improvement over my last visit to Europe when I often found myself with a full bladder and an empty wallet. No Euro, no pee! Tap-to-pee makes it easy!

<TMI Alert!> There are some really cool bathrooms. One of them had a sound system and a screen in the stalls. When doing my, ahem business, I listened to soothing music and inspirational messages while watching deer run in slow motion. I could have stayed there all day.

I was particularly impressed with another bathroom that had a pee waterfall about 20′ long and 8′ high. It worked like this: You stand on a little ledge in front of the waterfall and then the water would start flowing faster. Picture a miniature Victoria Falls. And then you pee into the waterfall. It was stunning. I wish the ladies could experience something like this, but alas, anatomy.

I would have taken a photo, but doing so in the bathroom would have been super creepy. So here is a crappy picture:

</TMI Alert!>

The No Bullshit Attitude Is Good. There are semi-dangerous things all over Amsterdam and the Netherlands:

• There are canals everywhere and most don’t have guard rails of any kind. More than one drunk person must fall in every year.
• Small electric cars and mopeds are allowed in the bike lanes. And don’t forget that bikes DO NOT slow down for pedestrians. Or anything.
• Here is working windmill where the blade comes very close to the ground. It was also a house at one time. If you were the windmill caretaker and got too close, this thing could take you out! BONK!!! (I seriously wonder how many people got whacked by a windmill back in the old days when there were 1000s of them?!??)

One of the tour guides mentioned that it’s very difficult to sue in the Netherlands. If you do something stupid and injure yourself, like challenging the Windmill of Death in a Don Quixote-esque drunken stupor, it’s on you. This is much better than the I-got-rear-ended-at-2-mph-and-now-I’m-hiring-a-lawyer attitude in America.

Invader. The street artist Invader hangs 8-bit mosaics in random public places. Mindy happened to spot this one in Antwerp and it made my day (I’m easily amused. You should know this now from the Pee Waterfall).

Traveling With Friends

FI folks. It was really neat traveling with a large group of friends. Two of them, Randy and Laura from Laundromats101, are people that Mindy and I met way back in 2014. We don’t get together often, but when we do, it’s a great time. (Sorry Laura and Randy for this ridiculous photo.)

FI Friends Travel. Kristen did a spectacular job organizing this trip and taking care of us. While I didn’t expect it, she was constantly looking out for our group, always on top of everything. Sometimes I needed to be herded like a wayward, low-IQ sheep and Kristen always led me back to the flock. If the TV weather thing (her normal job) doesn’t work out, she could do this for a living. Thank you Kristen for a great trip!!

Planning for more planned travel. I’m a hopeless planner. I can easily fall down a mile deep rabbit hole on something as trivial as researching airport hotels. Going on organized trips minimizes my OCD because someone else has done all of the work. An organized trip is something I had never considered until fairly recently. Now, I’m certain I’ll be taking more including Kristen’s trip to Japan next year.

Note: Kristen, if you’re reading this, I’m sorry if I wasn’t supposed to let the neko out of the baggu.

Random stats:

• There were 38 people in the FI Friends Travel group. The ship had 160 passengers, so we were about 25% of the guests.
• I had crossed paths with about half of them at various FI gatherings prior to the cruise.
• There were 7 people from Longmont aboard.

Life Is Good

Reflecting back on the trip, I’m a fortunate human:

• Damn, I got to see a windmill! I even went inside a working one! As a kid, I dreamed of seeing the windmills of the Netherlands. Seeing them in person was really cool! 10/10!
• Security was my goal. Trips like this are icing on the cake. I didn’t save for FIRE, at least not the retire early part of it. I saved to create security and peace. Trips like this are just little bonuses. My life has somehow turned into a fairy tale that I never saw coming and still have a difficult time processing.
• I have a lot of good people in my life. I feel awkward around most humans. I’m bad at making small talk about sports, weather, TV shows, fashion, politics, or celebrity bullshit. The What do you do? question leads to severe awkwardness 99% of the time. But I’m almost instantly comfortable with people who I’ve met through the FI community. While we don’t actually talk about money that much, having FI as a core principle is a strong filter that results in a lot of other commonalities.
• We flew fancy this time. Before this trip, I had never flown anything but coach. I logged into the United app and saw that I could bid on a first class seat for $400 and points. I have no status with the airline, so our chances of getting the upgrade were remote. But we got it anyway. I’ve heard people talk up the fancy seats like they’re the best thing ever. I don’t quite agree with that, but it was a fun experiment and I’d consider it again for an international trip.
• Mega Mindy! On the trip, I learned that there is a superhero in the Netherlands named Mega Mindy. Now I have something fun to needle Real Mindy about.

More 1500 Days!!!

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