Winter Holiday 2015/2016 - Cocoa Beach, Florida

Last minute holidays are the best. A few days before Christmas 2015, we learned that we had more days off for the winter holidays than we were expecting, so we quickly looked for cheap trips, and found that Florida had great deals happening. Great deals; as long as we were flexible and not too picky.

First, we flew at an undesirable time on Christmas morning. We got up before sunrise for a flight leaving in the early morning hours. As kids across America were waking up to see what Santa had left them, we were having coffee in the United Airlines Lounge in LAX. We were able to purchase first class tickets on the cheap. Admittedly, flying first class domestic on an older plane, isn't nearly as snazzy as flying first class international, but it was still a treat. We had champagne.

The other way we saved money? We were willing to fly into Miami and do a long drive to our destinations of Cocoa Beach and Orlando.

I was a little sad that we didn't decide to spend a few days in Miami. It's a city that I've always wanted to visit. We considered it, but the hotels were outrageously expensive, so it wasn't in the budget for this trip.

Dunkin' Donuts was in the budget.

Here we are In line for coffee and donuts after a long morning. What do we need? Coffee. When do we need it? NOW!

We were surprised to find a very long queue of fellow Christmas Day travelers. Everyone was grabbing coffee. This was the first of two, Dunkin' Donuts stops to keep us fueled on our drive to Cocoa Beach.

Warm chocolate chip cookies and a slightly lackluster Christmas tree were waiting for us in reception at the Double Tree by Hilton in Cocoa Beach. Yummy cookies.

Our room was clean and comfortable. The sun was already starting to set, so we couldn't see the real reason people book this hotel = the beach. It has direct beach access. The beaches are gorgeous.

We asked reception for recommendations for a nice Christmas dinner, and they ( of course) recommended the restaurant right in the hotel. It looked okay, nothing fancy or even offering a special holiday menu, but they had pizza and we were hungry. Doesn't pizza always seem to work? After about thirty minutes, we gave up. The restaurant was approximately 1/3 full, but nearly all of the tables were dirty. We had our drink order taken after fifteen minutes of waiting and the server never came back. They didn't appear to be understaffed, just not very quick with the customer service. We saw them standing around, chatting. The general vibe was bad.

Driving around, we saw that Cocoa Beach was a ghost town. We kept driving until we found Captain J's, glowing with an open sign.

Truthfully, Captain J's was a bit of a dive. But they had fried gatortail and wooden pelicans. Nothing says Christmas dinner like....

The decor inside didn't disappoint. Water features, more pelicans, and a billion Christmas tree lights.

Captain J's was awesome. We feasted on gator, calamari, crab, and lobster; washing it down with delicious tiki drinks. Sorry mom, I loved your turkey dinners that we ate every-single-Christmas...but my meal at Captain J's was honestly the best holiday meal ever. And our food came on metal platters shaped like shells. It's called "Cocoa Beach Classy". Loved it.

The next morning, we woke up at sunrise and walked to the beach. So beautiful and warm. Wearing shorts on December 26th made me ridiculously happy.

Dan had his first Waffle House meal for breakfast. It was a hit.

Here are a few more Cocoa Beach snaps that we took on our way out of town, heading towards Kennedy Space Center.

Our time in Cocoa Beach was brief, but it's definitely a town that I'd love to visit again. The beaches were clean with soft sand, perfect for a beach holiday.

Amsterdam- Karen Accidentally Wanders Into the Red Light District...

My last day in Amsterdam was spent walking all over the city, trying to visit as many sights as possible. I even found myself in the infamous Red Light District, but that wasn't until later in the day.

I started with breakfast at the Esprit Cafe.

Yes, Esprit, as in the clothing company, has a very nice cafe right in the middle of Spuistratt. As a teenager, Esprit was a brand that I loved, but their presence seems to have disappeared over the years. Gone from all of the malls I frequent. Seeing them in Amsterdam, I assumed that they were a European brand, but nope, Esprit is Californian. My home state! Mind blown. The name always seemed foreign and their advertising made me think Europe.

The Esprit Cafe was adorable and empty. Amsterdam is a city that stays up late and I found it tough to find breakfast options. I was the only person breakfasting at the Esprit Cafe when they opened at 10am.

My latte and "Red Riding Hood" yogurt were delicious.

After fortification, I walked to the Rembrandt House Museum.

Rembrandt lived and worked in this house for over twenty years. The admission was thirteen euros and included a self-guided audio tour. Docents were also positioned throughout the house to answer additional questions and to give art demonstrations. I love art museums and I love Historical sites: the Rembrandt House Museum was the best of both worlds.

One of my favorite parts of the museum was Rembrandt's curiosities room, filled with sculptures, bones, taxidermied animals, and other artifacts from his travels. These objects served as reference materials and inspiration for his art. I liked this room, because it was unexpected and so different from the other rooms of the house, which were filled with his paintings. This room was more in line with a natural history museum.

The Rembrandt House Museum is a must-do for art lovers. It's small and only takes a few hours to tour. I headed to my next stop, The Amsterdam Museum, but very quickly, ended up completely lost. I had forgotten my map and the data on cell was already over the limit, so I blissfully wandered around until I figured things out. This hour-ish of being lost, was one of the highlights of my trip. I was off-the-tourist path, in eclectic neighborhoods with cute parks and quirky shops. I took pictures and explored.

Eventually, I ended up near the main train station in a neighborhood that was familiar. I wasn't super close to the Amsterdam Museum and I was hungry, so I tried Toastable, a sandwich/smoothie chain that I had seen around town.

I bought a grilled cheese with spinach sandwich and a freshly made strawberry smoothie. I picked a counter seat in front of a large window.

The window faced an alley, but also had a partial view of the street. This was a street that I had walked up and down nearly every day of the trip. It had a church directly across from Toastables. I guess I had always looked at the church, because I never noticed that across from that church, next to Toastables, in my full view as I ate lunch, was this...

I did a double take, a triple take, and I tried to make sense of the sign on the window.

Yep, I was looking at part of the Red Light District.

As I ate my lunch, I caught glimpses of the woman working inside as she let men in and out of her establishment. I saw one very nervous, older gentleman, circle the block three times, before finally approaching the door. In the time it took me to eat, I witnessed three customers, and even had the prostitute give me a friendly wave and smile, when she caught me gawking. I waved back of course, sandwich in hand.

I didn't purposefully seek out or avoid the Red Light District during my stay, so when I finally saw it, it was just funny. Funny that it was so out in the open, next to a grilled cheese shop. Amsterdam was a full of surprises.

Late in the day, I made it to the Amsterdam Museum.

Amsterdam has so many amazing art museums, but it was refreshing to visit a history museum and learn about the city that I had spent the last week touring. I wish that I had done this museum on the first day of my visit, it would have given me a better foundation for touring the city and appreciating its diversity. This would be a great museum if you have kids, as there were many interactive elements.

I left the Amsterdam Museum with the intention of squeezing in one more stop: The Katten Kabinet aka AN ENTIRE MUSEUM DEDICATED TO CAT ART! Seriously, the Katten Kabinet had my name written all over it, and I'm certain, that had I visited, it would have been my favorite thing about Amsterdam.

A CAT MUSEUM!

Armed with a map that a docent at the Amsterdam Museum gave me, including her drawn instructions for getting to the Katten Kabinet (a fellow cat lover, she understood me), I set out. I had just made it to the flower market, when it started pouring rain. I could see lightening zig-zag across the sky and heard thunder that was positively nerve rattling. The streets completely emptied and I made a bee-line for my hotel, which was about five minutes away. By the time I walked into the lobby, the map had turned to pulp, and I looked like I had just tripped into a canal and swam home. By the time the rain let up, the museum was closed.

Katten Kabinet, I'll be back!

Amsterdam - D'Vijff Vlieghen

On our last evening in Amsterdam, we dined at D'Vijff Vlieghen, with Dan's best friend from England, Paul.

D'Vijf Vlieghen means "Five Flies" in Dutch and although the name might not sound very appealing, the restaurant is lovely, and I enjoyed the whimsical fly theme peppered throughout.

We dined on a pre-fixe seven course dinner, which naturally included a cheese course. I think I must have eaten more cheese during my week in Amsterdam, than in the rest of the weeks of my life combined. Did I grow tired of cheese? Nope.

The presentation of the after-dinner tea was unique, with the loose tea leaves in test tubes. I tried the D'Vijff Vlieghen blend made specifically for the restaurant. Slightly sweet and very good.

We practically closed down the restaurant and after dinner, our server took us on a tour. D'Vijff Vlieghen is comprised of five seventeenth century homes and was turned into a restaurant during the 1930's. The restaurant has counted many celebrities among its patrons, such as Walt Disney, Orson Wells, and Mick Jagger. All of the chairs in the dining room have an engraved brass plate with the name of a celebrity who has dinned at D'Vijff Vlieghen.

Here are some shots of the interior of the restaurant. I like the coat of armor.

Our D'Vijff Vlieghen dinner last nearly four hours. We walked out of the restaurant feeling extremely stuffed, slightly tipsy from the wine, and very happy from the experience.