Haarlem nights

We've had a really nice weekend here in the Amsterdam area. After coming up (oddly enough, on the same flight as The Big Finn), we got to our dump of a hotel in neighboring Haarlem. It turns out there's a big trade show in Amsterdam this weekend (as evidenced by the large number of middle-aged men wearing name tags and either suits or khakis and golf shirts), so there were no rooms to be found in the city. After the initial shock of a stuffy room (smoking, despite requesting non-smoking) with peeling wallpaper, stains on most surfaces (including the bedspread) and loud kids partying outside, we were very pleasantly surprised by Haarlem. It's only 15 minutes by train from Amsterdam, but it's self-contained in the middle of the countryside and sort of feels like Amsterdam on sedatives. Quite charming, but with a much more local feel and quieter pace. We've enjoyed our forays into Amsterdam (Indonesian food...yummy), about which more when we return, but we also have to give a big thumbs-up to Haarlem as well. Now tomorrow after work it's off to Norway to discover my roots and touch a fjord...