We arrived late on Saturday night to our Rick Steve's recommended hotel, the "Hotel Ambassade" on the Herengracht canal. The hotel is in a maze of connected houses, so getting to our room meant an elevator to the 3rd floor, walk down a number of different hallways, up a tiny staircase to the room on the left. Our room happened to be in the attic of one of the houses, but what the room lacked in ceiling space it made up for abundantly in charm!
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| That's our room all lit up in the attic! |
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| Ceiling light! |
We went to dinner that night at Lucius, a fish place, that the hotel recommended as it was nearby and the kitchen stayed open until 23:00. The fish tank in one wall was amazing - all living creatures, even the coral and grasses!
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| I'm not coming out until the kitchen is closed... |
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| Brilliant! |
Over the next couple of days we went to some museums. The Rijksmuseum - currently under construction, so only a small wing was open featuring the most important Dutch Masters with some history of Holland thrown in. The Van Gogh Museum - Van Gogh's works are organized chronologically as they mirror the changes in his life and also includes works by many great Impressionists that influenced him. The Anne Frank House where one of the world's most famous diaries was written during her two years hiding in the "secret annex" behind her father's business. Museums we missed included the Houseboat Museum, Tulip Museum, Museum of Bags and Purses, and the Hash, Marijuana, and Hemp Museum...guess we'll have to come back again!
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| Statue of Anne Frank |
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| Life imitates art? At breakfast one morning... |
The majority of our time was spent sightseeing around town at art markets, flea markets, shopping streets, and art galleries. We bought a couple small pieces at some of the Sunday art markets...but alas, no tulip bulbs or wooden shoes at the Bloemenmarkt! We frequented Henri Willig Cheese and More (a couple of times) - free samples of a wide variety of delicious cow and goat cheeses...and free samples of the truly delectable Dutch stroopwafels - a kind of sandwich cookie with caramel in the middle - I guess that is the "and More"! Getting lost in the canals, nearly run over by the myriads of bicycles (rumor has it there are nearly as many bikes as there are residents!), and enjoying some great food made for a fun couple of days. Sunday was an unbelievably schizophrenic weather day - sunny one minute...and POURING rain the next. Unfortunately one of those pouring rain moments occurred as we were passing through the red light district on our way to the other side of town - not exactly the place to just "duck in" to the nearest doorway. Sad to say, even at 11:00 on a Sunday morning, some of the windows were occupied with "wares."
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| Tulips, tulips, tulips (bulbs, that is...) |
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| The inspiration behind Crocs?? |
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| Just "Cheese" - no "More" - at Henri Willig Cheese and More! |
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| The pouring rain from our hotel room window. |
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| Bike with flowers...artsy... |
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| Amsterdam loves bikes! |
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| A wooden rental bike! |
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| Even the "J Lo" of Amsterdam travels by bike!! (You have to look closely...) |
Have you figured out yet why "XXX" doesn't always mean what you think? Although XXX can certainly refer to the city's notorious red light district, it is also Amsterdam's "coat of arms"! According to the website "Why Go Amsterdam"...
The XXX symbol is three St. Andrew’s Crosses in white on a black stripe on a red background. On the flag they appear horizontally, but most other places they appear vertically. St. Andrew was a fisherman who lived in the 1st Century AD and was said to have been crucified on an X-shaped cross. The Amsterdam XXX symbol dates back to the year 1505 when the city was a fisherman’s town, so the coat of arms was established as the symbol for the city itself and it also flew as a flag on all ships registered in Amsterdam.
Who knew??!!
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| Interesting canal guardian... |
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| Classic Amsterdam architecture. |
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| Are you Amsterdam? |
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| Beautiful canals. |
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| Reflecting kitty... |
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| The infamous letters on Museumplein. |
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| From the other end. |
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| Two Amsterdam classics! |
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| One of the many picturesque churches. |
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| Old juxtaposed with new...and a little "xxx" for good measure! |
