Aug 10th–Amsterdam

 

This morning we docked at Amsterdam at 8am   Nancy and I headed out on our own on a walking tour at 8:30pm. We walked along a number of the canals and through neighborhoods of the city.   

 

Our first goal was the Anne Frank house museum, which we reached at 9:30pm, but the line was already a two blocks long.  So we took this picture of the Anne Frank statue and kept walking.  The photo on the right is of little porcelain delft boxes in a shop window.

 

We reached the Dam, the main square in the City.  On one side is the residence of the royal family (next photo) and on another is the New Cathedral, built between the late 15th and mid 17th centuries, where all the inaugurations of the kings and queens occur.   Also on the square are some very nice shopping areas (second photo) and restaurants.

 

We next found the Old Cathedral, begun in 1250 and added to over the next couple of centuries, which we liked a lot more then the new one. Organ music filled the soaring space with its painted wooden ceiling.  Here is buried Rembrandt's wife, Saskia.  Near the cathedral was a house that had a small catholic church hidden in the upper floors.  It is called Ons’ Lieve Heer op Solder, Our Lord in the Attic, the second oldest museum in Amsterdam.  The catholic church was outlawed for a couple of hundred years, so a local catholic merchant built the church inside the top three stories of his row house.     It operated as a church for a couple of hundred years, from about 1650 to about 1850.     It was the best part of our visit in Amsterdam.

 

Both the Old Cathedral and Church in the attic are in the red light district.  Amsterdam is  proud of the red light district, it is marked on all the maps, announced on all the tours, etc.  

We had lunch outdoors close to the canal bus station and then caught a hop on hop off canal boat.    We went over to the Rijkimuseum, which has a number of Rembrandt paintings and paintings from individuals he taught or who taught him. The building is undergoing remodeling as and most of the collection was not available for viewing.  After the museum we caught the boat headed back towards the ship. Unfortunately the boat was running late, and by the time we got off, we had to really push on to reach the ship.   All passengers were suppose to be on board at 5:30pm, and we arrived at 5:35pm.   We asked if we were the last ones to arrive, and they said, we were not, in such a way that is sounded like there were quite a few more. But the ship pushed off exactly on time at 6pm, so either they made it, or are going to be catching a plane to our next stop.

We were amazed at the bikes in Amsterdam, they are everywhere.  Many of the roads have the road lanes, the pedestrian walkway, and a bike road.   You don’t walk on the bike road, it is only for bikes.  There is bike parking everywhere.   This picture is a portion of a three story bike garage.    There was an underground bike garage at the train station, with a built in bike repair shop.   But not all bikes end up happy, the second picture is debris that was being pulled from a canal bottom.

We had a dam good time in Amsterdam…

For dinner we ate in the ship’s specialty Italian restaurant, Toscana.   Nancy had Maine Lobster over pasta and spicy tomato sauce.   I had the rack of lamb.

We are typing this while we are waiting for tonight's entertainment, “the loud mime”.   He turned out to be fairly good.  He talks and does not have the painted face, but tends to do visual humor.

Were back in the North Sea, and the boat is really rocking, the motion of the ocean.   Holly, you would definitely not be happy right now…..