Back To Old Ways

Um, all that stuff I said about having learned to do the second leg of our trip in comfort & style? Yeah, well I have come to realize that was all utter bullshit. It was supposed to be easier this time round; our muscles were seasoned, we figured out how to successfully read our foreign maps with fewer instances of getting lost, and we even had squishy beds to look forward to through couch surfing.

We left Amsterdam for Rotterdam and it was like the first day all over again. Almost a week and a half of lounging in Vondlepark with wine and sweets and we were beginners again. We didn't find our way to our nice squishy bed until 11:30pm, far after the time our host had already gone to bed-we were supposed to get there at 8pm. Trying to find a safe, free, place to camp in a big city so late at night seemed like the worst idea ever, so we decided to bite the bullet and spring for a hotel. We were so exhausted and irritable at this point that all the latent obscenities started coming out.

''What the hell should we do?''
''Fuck if I know.''
''Damn it all to hell! I just want to sleep.''
''Well shit. And just how should we go about that?''

For some ungodly reason all the budget hotels that we could find were full. We were finally sent to a hotel that had one more room for 120€. We were so tired we were ready to hand over our credit card saying, ''Ah, fuck it.''

Trying to find that hotel we came across Hotel One. The young, slightly nervous concierge said that indeed, he too had just one extra room, which normally went for 100€.
I leaned in, ''Normally?''
''Um, yes...but tonight maybe...maybe I could rent it for 90€'', which sounded like there was room for negotiation. As the daughter of a woman with whom there is always room for negotiation, hesitation is always an invitation.
''How about 80€?''

It was a deal! I've never bartered with a hotel before, but I figure that now I should just add it into my hotel rule-of-thumb.

Trying to reach a destination by a certain time is really difficult and leaves no room for spontaneity. We like to have coffee and read for an hour, two if the book is really good. We like to stop at the kids playground because they gasp! have a kick-ass zip-line. Oh, and not to mention getting lost, which we do often. We don't have reliable Internet access, so coordinating housing is hard. So if the night's arrangements get messed up, by that time we're so tired that we'll even consider staying at the Hilton by way of calculating how many ice creams will be necessary to skip in order to break even.

This is what we learned and now we're back to old ways.