A Day in Amsterdam

Although we were both tired from our pilgrimage to Keukenhof the day prior, Chris and I set out early once again on Sunday morning in order to catch a train to Amsterdam.  We had planned to spend the day exploring and photographing the city before returning home to relieve Jim of a full weekend of Daddy Duty.  It would be both my own and Chris' first time in Amsterdam; Jim and I had not yet taken the opportunity to visit Amsterdam, though we will be spending Mother's Day weekend there. 

 

Once our train delivered us to Amsterdam, we found our way to a tourist office, where we signed up for a Hop-On/Hop-Off Canal Cruise that we believed would give us the most comprehensive tour of the city in the little time that we had there.  The boat would make stops at all of the most popular tourist destinations, allowing passengers to "hop off" at any stop for a closer look.  Chris and I spent about 10 minutes on the cruise before disembarking at the site of Anne Frank's home and museum, only to find the line to enter to measure about a mile long.  While we were on foot, though, we decided to explore the neighborhood a bit before we tried to find our way back on to the cruise.

 

We never did make it back on the cruise, though.  We thought it simply made more sense for us to walk from one site to the next; not much distance separated the most popular destinations from one another, and we were better able to take pictures as we walked.  We attempted to find our way back to our cruise route, but realized somewhere along the way that we were using a map for the Hop-On/Hop-Off Bus Tour. 

 

We may have wasted money on the tour that we spent all of 10 minutes on, but it was no matter - I felt like we saw and did quite a bit on our own.  We sampled delicious Dutch cheese, took dozens of photographs of canals, bicycles, and coffee shops, dined al fresco at a café, played sidewalk hopscotch, shopped for souvenirs, walked along the flower market, visited Rembrandt Square, witnessed a pseudo-police chase, stopped at a local Starbucks, and sat in the letters of the I Amsterdam landmark.  I doubt that we would have done half as much had we spent more than 10 minutes on the boat tour! 

 

For as many pictures as I took of flowers the day before, I took a surprisingly small number of pictures of a great big city!  Still, there are plenty to share:

 

We arrived at the Hengelo train station so early that the ticket office wasn't open yet!  Chris and I used the time to play around with our cameras amidst the morning light and shadows.

 

 

Awaiting our train

Aboard our Hop-On/Hop-Off Canal Cruise

Shortly before our first - and last - "Hop-Off" point

The last time that we would see a tour boat stopped for hopping on or off!

I just adored the canals of Amsterdam!

I think I took this picture right after I saved Chris' life.  She kept forgetting that the old cobblestone streets were actual roads!

I'm excited to return to Amsterdam in a couple weeks!

Two girls from Wisconsin can't pass up the chance to explore a cheese museum!

But after touring Keukenhof on Saturday, we DID skip the opportunity to enter the Amsterdam Tulip Museum. 

I would have liked the chance to visit the Anne Frank house and museum, but I wasn't going to stand in line for hours to do so!

So much color along the canals!

Funky boat

Playing sidewalk hopscotch while making our way through the city

Cute little café front



These canal surfers had a whole lot of people watching them from the bridges above the canals!  No pressure or anything, right?

Rembrandt Square was filled with people rooting for the Ajax, Amsterdam's voetbal (soccer) team, at bars and clubs. 

There seemed to be a coffee shop on every street corner in Amsterdam.  I chose to go to Starbucks for my coffee.

Rembrandt

Chris and I didn't know who the figures around Rembrandt were supposed to be, but people were posing with them, so we did too!  After a little online research, I learned that the smaller statues are characters taken directly from Rembrandt's famous painting "The Night Watch". 

I was only able to fit a few of the "I Amsterdam" letters in my frame...and then some guy bent over to tie his shoe just as I was taking Chris' picture, thereby forcing me to crop even more letters out!

I would expect that you would have to arrive quite early in the morning to get an unobstructed picture of the attraction!

Back to the canals!  At this point, I think that we were trying to find the cruise route.



Still looking...

We give up.



We never did walk through the Red Light District, though we certainly saw our fair share of coffee shops and pornography while we were in Amsterdam!  We had to have been close to the Red Light District, though.

As Maddie would say, "BIKES!"

More bikes...and another coffee shop

Back to the train station!