Amster-dayum - day 1

As my daughter calls it...
We were staying at the Hotel Room Mate Aitana on the Ij-Dock. It was on the edge of the Ij Lake and windy - to say the least...

Curious architecture, complete with tree on the roof.

Our hotel, more strange architecture, but all the new buildings on the Ij-Dock were a bit funky.

This contraption is for taking boozy tours around the city, imagine it would be a bit nippy in February!

In the shopping mall under the Central station there was this curiously named shop. The stock didn't seem to have much to do with the name either.

Thousands of bikes parked outside the central station.

Beautiful gold and blue angel on top of a building near the station.

Wini - a vintage shop on Haarlemmerstraat. I didn't buy anything there.

Bike with really fat tyres, seems ideal for the cobbled streets of Amsterdam.

Gorgeous architecture on Haarlemmerstraat.

Another vintage store. Again I didn't find anything I liked in this one either. I am hard to please.

Interesting looking church.

Cheese shop! Didn't buy any cheese either.

Outside of an old school, Sint Antonia Meisjesschool on Haarlemmerstraat.

Tony Choco-lonely Chocolate in many varieties.

Thrift store raising funds for a homeless charity. I did buy a skirt in here which could be 1970s or 1980s - a bargain at 5 Euros.

More amazing gabled houses including this one which was leaning forwards somewhat ominously compared to the buildings either side of it.

The smallest cinema I've ever seen.

We stopped for coffee and cake in a small coffee shop. Gorgeous pastries available.

And the coffee shop had a resident cat. This has to be the fattest cat I've ever seen. 

Cakes with raspberry (furthest away) and gooseberry (closest to camera) - delicious but a tad too much.

Curious chocolate flavours in the coffee shop. Banana wasabi? Really? I wonder how much of that they sell?