Exploring Amsterdam

Community Highlights Europe Exploring Amsterdam

We started our second day here in our lovely pad on the canal with a tasty breakfast prepared by our host Katrien. She left this tray of goodies out side our door in the morning. Still adapting to the time-change we were pretty hungry and we appreciated this hearty breakfast. Here are some pics and the morning view from our room.

There is a big old church across the canal called the Oude Kerk (Old Church) that plays the bells on a pretty regular basis and it quite nice to hear the short songs. It is quite a contrast to the red light district located practically next door. An interesting juxtaposition. You can see the church in the last photo above.

Today was a day of more exploring, mostly on foot. We walked over to Dam Square where we started another self-guided walking tour of the Jordaan neighbourhood. This is an area where the locals live and it’s not very far away from the hustle and bustle of the tourist areas. A really beautiful area with lovely homes, coffee shops, small bars and restaurants. And of course, canals. You know I have to admit that I did it not realize how many canals there are here. The first city that comes to my mind when I think about canals is Venice, but Amsterdam has way more.

On our way we passed the Anne Frank house. We did not enter the museum and might save that for another trip. Here is her house and a small statue outside the West Church.

Getting close the lunch, we headed back to Dam Square to the neat old Beehive department store had lunch in their cool cafeteria. Beth had a Burrata salad and I went for the rare sliced rib-eye beef with an egg on top!

On Sundays you can ride a neat old - somewhat restored - electric tram for a 1 hour jaunt around the city. Feeling a bit tuckered we thought sure, why not. There was no nodding off on this ole trolley, it rattled and clanked over the street car tracks as we toured around the town.

We strolled back to our area for a much needed afternoon coffee and treat. There is nice coffee shop attached to the outside of the Old Church (you might be able to make it out in the photo from our window). They have a sign posted “No Laptops” , this is a place for meeting friends and chatting. Life is good!.

This last photo I wanted to show you all the building where we are staying. It is the tall building in the middle of the photo. Our room is the 3rd floor windows facing the canal. We enjoyed the rest of the afternoon in our perch looking over the canal and watching the world go by. Tomorrows will be a day of culture as we hit the museums. Bye for now. Also, feel free to leave a message and let us know who’s out there following along with us!

Bye for now.

This featured blog entry was written by Ross Walker from the blog From Canals to Croissants.
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