See Amsterdam by Boat


According to the guide books, you can’t go to Amsterdam and not see the Rijksmuseum with its collection of the Dutch masters, and the Van Gogh museum.  Verda and I wanted to do those, Bill is a flea-market aficionado, so he wanted to explore the street markets, and Ron, ever the sailor, wanted to take a boat ride on the canals.

Sunday morning we had juice, fruit and croissants fresh from the bakery in our rooms rather than pay the almost $30 for the two of us to have breakfast in the hotel.  It turned out that having a restaurant in the hotel didn’t matter since it was too expensive for us to want to eat there.  Another lesson learned: don’t make your choice of hotel dependent on its having a restaurant on the premises.  In Amsterdam, there are many bars and restaurants within walking distance of wherever you stay.  And, if you don’t want to walk, you can hop on the tram and hop off at any of the “pleins” for refreshment.

After breakfast, we took the tram to Museumplein, the stop for both museums that we wanted to see.  When we saw the line for the Rijks, Ron balked.  He hates standing in lines and can’t deal with crowds.  Kind of a problem when you’re a tourist and every tourist has the same guide books that recommend the same attractions. We agreed we would come back later in the day and see if it was a shorter wait.  Secretly, I think he and I were both thinking that we had just seen the Rembrandt exhibit at the Phoenix Art Museum a week before we left, so a lot of the Dutch masters weren’t here, they were in Phoenix!

So we continued on to the Van Gogh museum, just down the “straat” where we found a similar line, but this time it was I who rebelled.  I insisted that this was one thing I didn’t want to miss.  The line was moving and if we put everything off until late afternoon we certainly would not be able to fit it all in.  Bill and Verda agreed to go with me, so Ron reluctantly gave in.

There were hordes of people inside, and the mob was moving very, very slowly.  Verda and I tried to navigate our way around the crowds, and naturally we lost Bill and Ron immediately.  We didn’t make it up to the third floor because we had agreed to meet up and have lunch, but Ron said he did go up to the third floor - just to escape the crowd - and saw works by Van Gogh’s friends and colleagues - Gauguin, Cezanne, Toulouse-Lautrec - so, if you go, make sure you allow enough time to see the entire collection.  For 10 euros it’s your chance to get up close and personal with some of the best known of the Impressionists.  And, if you purchase Canal Boat passes (18 euros for 24 hours) you get a 1 euro discount at the Rijksmuseum, the Van Gogh, and the Rembrandt museums.


After a brief visit to the gift shop for souvenirs, we hopped back on the #2 tram and got off at Leidseplein.  We had learned that “plein” meant something like “square” or “plaza” and we could always find restaurants, bars, outdoor cafes and souvenirs at any of the “pleins.”  Bill and I are big basketball fans and we were dying to know what was going on back home at the NCAA basketball championships.  We saw a sports bar with a schedule of all the sporting events they had available so we headed there.  Very friendly staff, very pretty waitresses, very interesting menu and as promised by the guidebooks, the unmistakable smell of marijuana burning. After a bite of lunch and a beer, we decided to take a boat tour in order to see more of the city in a short amount of time.


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