Day 1 Amsterdam
We had been in Amsterdam on our Grand Tour 2014, but that time we opted for a half-day seeing the Corrie Ten Boom Museum in Haarlem and a timed visit to the Anne Frank House back in Amsterdam. After that, we visited the Benjihof (a quiet oasis). I also had scheduled an appointment with an Osteopath (in the Red Light District, of all things) because my back was much more sensitive to long overseas flights back then, and I wanted to get all adjusted for our Grand European adventure. After dinner, we did a night canal cruise, but there was so much more we could have done. So, we hoped to come back, and our wish came true!
So, we added to that for this trip.
We arrived one hour early on our flight so we made it to our boat by 9 am! I was expecting it to be 11 am. We quickly checked in and were off to do a self-guided walking tour a la Rick Steves. We walked down Damrak, the main drag. So interesting seeing the different squares and little interesting things that he adds on his tours. One was a little Catholic church that is in the middle of Kalverstraat Street which is a pedestrian walking route with many stores. They were even holding a service, and we stopped for prayer. Great way to start our day.
(Picture of us walking down Damrak - Can you please pinch me? I cannot believe we are here again.)
We kept walking over canal after canal. There was still a bit of fall leave color. So we got some nice shots. We only had a few sprinkles on the way. One where we just ducked in a cheese shop and were able to buy some Dutch cheese with truffle. YUM!
We eventually made it to the Rijksmuseum and feasted on the Dutch masters like Rembrandt, Hals, Steen, Vermeer. Heaven. They are working on Rembrandt's famous Night Watch painting. So it was interesting to see the restorers restore. There was a special exhibition with a comparison between Rembrandt's paintings and Velasquez. So interesting. That exhibition was a bit on the crowded side, but it was not unbearable (like our trip to the Louvre in 2018). The non-exhibition part was crowd-free. So we loved that. There were many high school students so we just waited until their group would pass.
The painting that impacted me the most was Rembrandt's Isaac and Rebecca (known as The Jewish Bride). The gold in that painting cannot be experienced in a photo. I was in rapture. Paintings of immense worth just make me cry.
The great part is that the only time of day it poured was while we were in the museum. So, good timing!
After this, we had an hour wait until we got to the Van Gogh Museum's timed entry. We walked around to try to find a restaurant that sold the savory Dutch pancake called the pannekoeken, but there was not one close by, and we were SO TIRED (the consequences of three hours sleep on the plane and the time change was starting to kick in)! We found a sunny atrium room in another museum and sat and rested.
The Van Gogh Museum was everything that I had hoped it would be. I was in heaven. They did not allow photographs, but I had already decided to just experience the paintings. Oh my. I think having labored through 500+ pages of The Letters of Vincent Van Gogh made this trip through his life in paintings SO meaningful! Many of his paintings made me cry as I thought about where he was in his life when he painted it. Genius and madness are so close together. No words.
Field with Irises Near Arles hit me, but really, most of his paintings hit me. Just sayin'.
After this, we were just TOO tired to visit The Little Church in the Attic. So, we took the tram home and went over the same route we walked. We also didn't get to go to Mint Tower at 16:20 where pot smokers go to light up at 4:20pm every day! LOL! That's OK. (We were just going to watch and NOT participate.)
One last thing we needed to do was to go and get a cup for my best friend from the Starbuck's. We had seen two on the way but knew we could not carry bags in the museums. We took a cut through the mall in Central Station, and the last place was a Starbuck's!
We came back and showered and rested briefly before a wonderful meal with the two ladies we met while going through immigration. We overheard them tell the immigration officer that they were on our cruise, and we became fast friends. We ate with them and another person they work with. They are all lawyers by training and such SMART and intelligent people! I was so stimulated by the conversation. They are sharp cookies. They are also very real and authentic.
By the way, people on this boat ALWAYS ask you what you do and something about your life. This was true of the last cruise we were on in 2014 also. We were on a Rick Steves tour in 2018, and NO ONE, with the exception of the tour guide, asked us what I did until eight days into the journey. One person. With that conversation, there was NO follow up and continued conversation. That was it. There was a lot of listening done on that trip to others with very little reciprocal conversation. It was the strangest thing to have no curiosity on the part of other people. The ladies last night asked right away! The people at breakfast too. I made no long-term friends with the Rick Steves tour people, but I made friends from our trip in 2014 (we were going to go on another trip in 2020 with them, but they were BUSING, and that is not our favorite thing to do, but we LOVE river cruising).
We opted for the regional meal which was Dutch meatballs (bitterballen), an amazing whipped dish of root vegetables (hutspot), and a vanilla ice cream with the Dutch waffle with molasses inside (stroopwafel). Amazing food and great after not eating ALL day because we were on the go the whole time!
We wanted to go to the top of the library and see the view of the harbor, but we were just TOO TIRED.
After an Examen prayer where we reviewed God's gifts from the day, we crashed at about 9:15, but I woke up to someone calling me from Medford. I did not pick up and did a reverse search, and it was a spam phone call.
All that to say is that we got to see the dock pull out from the dock and even sat out on our veranda to watch the city lights of Amsterdam fade into the distance. It was lovely, though cold! I am so glad we paid just a little bit extra for a chair facing out on the inside and the veranda and two chairs on the outside!
George fell right back to sleep, but I could not. So I listened to my book. Well, we are now hoping to rent bikes and go by the windmills. I have to get ready. Such a great time.
P.S. Delta Airlines ROCKS. They have so many lovely extras for coach now. I highly recommend you fly them.
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