May 5 Arnhem and Burger's Zoo

We slept in till about 1230 yesterday, our roommate Jose was supposed to stay two nights, but I think Bryce's snoring and my constant tossing and turning drove him off.

The zoo here is supposed to be pretty good and it's within walking distance so we headed out around 2, after we ate some contraband sandwiches in our room (no outside food allowed at this hostel). The zoo was actually pretty awesome, I've only been to the zoos in Edmonton (sucks), Calgary (alright), and San Diego (amazing). Arnhem is a big step above Calgary and a step behind San Diego. They had penguins, elephants, leopards, cheetahs, lions, turtles, snakes, giraffes, rhinos, and a bunch more. It was raining a bit so some of the animals were hiding but we got to see most of them. Most of the cages were pretty huge too, I still felt bad for the animals.

There was also an aquarium in the zoo which was pretty amazing, some of the tanks were enormous. Filled with fish, sharks, sting rays, and other cool stuff. The only down side was that all of the signs were in Dutch and therefore we couldn't read about the animals.

We headed back and chilled in our room eating junk food and watching The Inbetweeners Movie (I've lost count as to how many times we watched it on this trip). We headed down to the bar to predrink, it wasn't empty like the previous night but being the only westerners at this hostel we didn't make any friends. We took a bus down town and headed to where the bars were. It's really an awesome location, picture Whyte Ave but all wrapped around in a square and only foot traffic. All of the bars seemed exactly the same though, night clubs with outdoor patios. We picked one with a terrible piano player and sat outside to drink. We met a Dutch girl and her boyfriend and did the usual talk of back home. She seemed very keen to tell us about the red light district in Amsterdam. It was cool to meet some locals instead of just other backpackers. By 12 we were pretty inebriated, doing what you normally do we jumped into the nearest donair shop. So far donairs in Europe are far superior to those back home, they have the usual mystery meat cylinder spinning against the heat lamps. You can also get lamb, chicken, or beef. And they top them with cabbage, lettuce, peppers, cucumbers, pickles, and all sorts of sauces instead of the typical onions, lettuce, and tomatoes back home. It was quite funny though, we couldn't read the Dutch menu, one of the cooks saw our puzzles faces and just said "I make you guys best donair!", even the immigrants here are multilingual.

The busses stopped running so we grabbed a cab, worth the extra euros in my mind. The closest bus stop to our hostel is still a bit of a walk, and all up hill.