Not wanting to waste a minute of our time in Amsterdam, we set our alarms for an early(ish) 9am wake-up. After stumbling around the room trying to find the light switch, we grab a shower and head through to the kitchen for breakfast. The owner, Frank, has been to the bakery and left us a couple of fresh croissants. We have these with coffee and juice, and then head out to explore the city.
We begin at the end of the road. We’d been told that there was a Monday market, and so we spend a while perusing the stalls. The main street is taken up with clothes and fabrics, while the square at the other end of is full of second-hand nik-naks, things that would be described as ‘vintage’ in order to gain a higher price for them and various pieces of ‘ethnic’ art. We soon realise that we’re unlikely to find anything of interest here (although we do spot a collection of Tintin books in Dutch, in which he doesn’t appear to be called Tintin).
We decide it’s time to start our proper exploration of the city, and decide to follow the walking route as laid out in the copy of the Lonely Planet on our Kindle. We don’t, however, have the Kindle with us and so our walking tour is a case of ‘join the dots’ using the marks made by Alice on her fold-out map. We combine this with half-remembered details from the Lonely Planet, and notes from the 14-year-old Rough Guide we found in the B&B.
The first bit is easy – head into the city centre. In the ten minutes it takes us to walk there we cross numerous bridges over the canals, and see more bicycles than you can shake a stick at. The bicycles are actually incredibly scary, or at least the bicycles combined with the people riding them are scary. These old bone shakers thunder along the road at insane speeds, crossing junctions without checking for traffic and all while the cyclist is texting a friend while listening to their iPod. I’m frankly amazed that we didn’t see even one accident, let alone a major pile-up considering the complete lack of care these cyclists appear to take. However, their bikes make for some wonderful photos assuming they’re locked up on a bridge.
The main square of Amsterdam is – like much of the city – cobbled. A tramline runs through the middle of it, but other than that its large open plaza is relatively free of traffic. It is, however, full of performance artists. We arrive as a man sets a small ball on fire and proceeds to roll it around his body like the crystal balls David Bowie uses in Labyrinth. More numerous, however, are people in costumes standing very still on step-stools. One has a particular good Darth Vader outfit, but others rely on poor quality gorilla costumes or what we assume are werewolves. The key thing about all of these is that their faces are covered by masks. When I first saw these types of statue performers on Las Ramblas in Barcelona when I first went InterRailing, I was really impressed. None of them wore masks and their props were often very clever or witty. Now it seems that any failed actor just buys a second-hand fancy dress costume and stands reasonably still in a town square.
The square is the site of Amsterdam’s largest cathedral which, due to the hefty (in our opinion) 10 Euro price-tag, was deserted of visitors. We just look through the window from the gift shop. Next door the town hall is covered in scaffolding, and Madame Tussauds opposite is promoting the opportunity to have your photo taken with Justin Bieber and Lady Gaga. I’m pretty sure it’s the same advertising campaign in London at the moment. On the other side of the tram tracks is the National Monument – a confusing mass of writhing bodies, prancing horses, and lots of coats of arms. Considering the quality of Dutch art over the years, this expression of national pride is a disappointing mish-mash of elements.
We then take a wandering meander through one of the back streets off Dam Square. The street takes us parallel to one of the canals and the walking route suggested marks out that we will soon double back on ourselves down the adjacent street – we assume there is lots to see in this area. Walking along, through a gap in the buildings we spy an interesting looking building and decide to cut across to see it. It turns out to be the Oud Church and is a very cute building amongst these tall thin houses.
Oud hardly needs a translation, and we soon work it out as being “old”. We see this in Amsterdam – that the Dutch is actually really quite similar to the English and it’s probably things like this that allow Brits to simply don a foreign accent whilst speaking English in a louder than normal voice and expect to be understood!
Back on the trail we are now directed along a few of the main streets that form the Red Light District. It’s a little odd to be walking down a street and suddenly see a lady or two in a window wearing just their underwear, but that’s how it’s done here! The guide books that we picked up in the station were quite open and clear about the Red Light District – we guess this is just another example of the Dutch being upfront about things. Then again, it’s ‘the oldest profession’ and Amsterdam has been a busy port for over half a millennium, so in a way it makes sense that the Dutch liberal approach to, well, anything should manifest itself here. The guidebooks, after saying the obvious (no photos please), go on to say that if you do get into some sort of trouble, or disagreement then find a Police Officer (because there are a lot about on the edge of the district) and then explain the situation. They urge you not to try and make up some story about being there for another reason (!) as this will make it a lot more difficult. After all, the guidebooks say, many people go there for the same thing, so don’t be shy! It does seem that a well regulated system makes it better for everyone.
We walk on through past many windows with ladies of the day/night/mid-morning and past a few shops and cinemas. The Red Light District also appears to be the hub of the cafe culture in Amsterdam, and we round our next corner to get a real whiff of why a lot of other people come to Amsterdam – and it’s only 10am in the morning!
As well as being the centre of all Amsterdam’s liberal entertainments, the Read Light District is also the oldest part of the city. The vast majority of the 17th-century buildings are still supported on the original wooden piles. As long as they remain submerged the houses are stable, but problems with the level of the ground water have meant that these have begun to dry out. Consequently some of the older buildings are beginning to experience subsidence, which in some cases is very noticeable as the houses begin to lean. Other houses have had the original wooden piles replaced with concrete, but we imagine that the cost and effort involved in doing this must be enormous. After all, the streets are so narrow that you often struggle to fit a car down them let alone a cement mixer!
Then again, the people of Amsterdam seem to be able to overcome all sorts of obstacles. For example, the houses are narrow but tall and the staircases are often too steep to carry furniture. The Dutch simply get around this by installing a pulley system on a roof and receiving large deliveries through the window, like we saw happening down a side street!
We walk out of the Red Light District and into a large square. This was one of the original early harbours behind the main dyke, but as ships got bigger the harbour was moved further out and the area around here filled in. In the centre is an impressive fortress-type building, De Waag, which for most of its life served as the weighing house. The building is now a fancy restaurant, and around it is a neat plaza. The gentrification is so effective that it’s hard to believe that this part of town was the centre of Amsterdam’s heroin problems in the 1980s.
We leave the square and walk down a major road passed Rembrandt’s House and a nearby cafe where he is reputed to have drunk. Or at least these were his house and his local cafe until he squandered all his money and was forced to move to a much cheaper part of town.
Nearby there’s busy market, which, although it does have some of the ‘I saw you coming’ stalls that the one in Jordaan had early that day, is slightly broader in its clientele and good for a browse. After a while we double-back on ourselves and make a bee-line across the canal for the Opera House / Town Hall complex. According to the guide book there is an exhibition here about how far below sea-level Amsterdam and the Netherlands is. As we approach we notice that the Opera House actually looks more like an abandoned housing estate, with a grey facade and scatterings of abandoned litter. Making our way towards what appears to be the main entrance, it turns out that buildings really are semi-abandoned (read: being refurbished) and so there’s no chance of getting in for the exhibition today. Walking away, though, the signs outside promote the 2011/12 opera season and so maybe it is all part of a ruse to keep tourists and punters from visiting.
We return to the southern bank and then cross the Amstel into a large, commercial square; Rembrandplein. We would normally rush through a place like this not taking the time to visit one of the over-priced cafes or Argentinian steak houses that run around their borders, but we are drawn to the central square as there is a busker playing with a loop pedal and performing a very long version of Hotel California. We sit down on one of the benches and take a listen. Due to the length of each song we only stay for two, but drop a few coins in his hat as we leave as it has been interesting to hear another loop-er.
The next section of street we walk along remains commercial but we stop in our tracks when one of the buildings stands out as something a little different. It’s marked on the map as the Pathe Turschirski and the guide book does make special mention it as being one of the most architecturally interesting cinemas in Europe. Despite this, we’re the only people who have stopped in their tracks to look in wonder at its beautiful mock-gothic architecture. It’s just stunning. We go inside and the architectural madness continues. Apparently the main screen is a classic example of 1920s design, and we might have sampled HP 7 pt 2 here if we hadn’t just seen in it the UK. We stop and take a few photographs, and this leads to a few of the other tourists stopping to take a look too rather than just walking blindly to the next big red bus / boat stop.
We’re feeling a little peckish and so decide to try and grab a sandwich for lunch (having realised our error in the UK of having a big meal at lunchtime and then not being hungry by the time dinner arrives). We keep stumbling on a chain of fast food places where you order your chips at the counter, but everything else is bought via a vending machine that makes up one long wall. The vending machine is made of see-through plastic and so you pick the compartment you want and open the door to grab your meal. These are filled up again from the other side which is where the kitchen is. It’s a fascinating concept, but we shy away from eating cooked food bought from a vending machine and so find something else to snack on in a shop nearby. Another brilliant concept we see over the weekend is the laundry place that is also an internet cafe – what a great combination!
We continue on our walking tour past the flower (bulb market) where we grab an ice cream and a seat for a while. It’s the first time we’ve taken to stop moving, which we realise is quite some going after 5 hours on the go! However, it turns out that Scotty is sitting with his back to the sun which resulted in the rather squinting shot of Alice below.
A short distance more and we were back in Dam Square where we began. With much of the afternoon still available for exploring, and with the weather finally starting to clear up, we wandered into the Begijnhof – an old private square where women who wanted to dedicate their lives to the church but didn’t want to take the vow and become nuns could live. Next door we look in the Amsterdam Historical Museum, but reading the guest book we note that a scary proportion of the comments are negative. We’ve never experienced this in a guest book before, and so assume that the museum really must be quite bad and so give it a miss.
Having finished our walk around central Amsterdam, we decide – perhaps erroneously we initially thought – to follow our friend Dave’s suggestion to visit the Seksmuseum. “You’d like it,” he argued. “It’s got Greek and Roman stuff as well as the good bits.” Both guidebooks actually agreed – one described it as the kind of collection that world class museums own but never show. And they were right. From Pacific island fertility statues to Greek pottery depicting some of the more explicit legends, through the changing shape (literally) of pin-ups in the first half of the 20th Century it was basically a very large collection of materials depicting humanity’s fascination with sex. There was some interesting stuff about the history of Amsterdam’s Red Light district. But perhaps I’m just trying to justify it as a valid academic visit: on the whole it was a load of pictures of naughty bits.
Leaving the museum we found that the evil sky had done its worse and it was now bucketing it down, so we headed off to find another place indoors. We’d been told by MummyB and G that a visit to (at least) one of the Jenever tasting houses was a must-do. Earlier in the day after finishing our walking tour back in Dam Square, we looked up where we could go. Behind the main hotel on the is a small passageway down which lies what claims to be Amsterdam oldest distillery, with a tasting room next door. When we first walked past the tasting room was closed, but a peek through the windows of the distillery showed a fantastic array of wooden barrels, coloured tubing, and dark brown glass storage jars that appear to be centuries old. We decided that we would return, and by the time we did the place was already filling up.
Surprisingly, considering it’s mentioned in most of the tourist guidebooks, there’s still a number of Dutch folk in there. The bartender, Hans, knows each regular’s favoured drink which in most cases consists of one of the dozens of liquors or jenevers on offer combined with a frothy glass of beer. We stand around watching for a while, trying to get a handle on how the place works although soon realise that we needn’t bother – there’s clearly no real system in place. Consequently we head to the bar and stand waiting to catch his attention.
He asks what we’d like and, with honesty, we say that we don’t know. He tries a different tack – take a look through the menu and choose a base flavour that takes our fancy. I opt for raspberry, and end up with him pouring three different tasters to try. The first is a chilled liquor which has had raspberry juice added to it, the second is eau-de-vie to which fruit is added and strained, and the third is a strange mix of raspberry, orange and some mysterious spices. The third really grabs my tastebuds, even though it’s as thick and as sweet as cordial, and I ask for a glass of it.
Meanwhile, Alice has opted for vanilla base and is given two options. The first is a straight alcohol with vanilla added to flavour it. The second is a thicker and creamier mixture that she prefers, and she too asks for a glass. Before we have the chance to pick it up we’re told by Hans that the ‘correct’ way to drink it is to take an initial slurp to make it easier to lift. He’s filled the glasses right to the brim and Alice has already pointed out the meniscus. We adopt the position, bending forward over the glass and slurp the first couple of millimetres out of the glass. Tradition fulfilled, we then stand and watch other people go through the ritual.
Hans is incredibly patient, and clearly loves his job. As the time ticks by more people come in to have a drink. Most of them – like us – have no idea what to have and so Hans talks them through the different flavours and options. Many want to try the jenever, and after finishing our glass of liquor – it takes us about 20 minutes because it’s so potent – we ask to try a bit of the jenever distilled from spelt, which has become our key grain of interest (if such a thing exists) thanks to the spelt beer Alice had when we were in Cambridge earlier in July. Despite our fascination of spelt, though, there’s no way either of us could drink the jenever. It tastes like a rough whiskey that’s more surgical spirit than beverage, and so we decide instead to have something a bit more palatable. After slowly finishing these next drinks, we decide it’s time to head off.
Considering we try to make a beeline for My Old Dutch whenever we are in London it would be wrong to avoid the fact that the best pancake house in Amsterdam is practically on our door-step, so we decide to head to The Pancake Bakery for a second night running for an early dinner. Scotty goes for his favourite chilli pancake and Alice opts for a Canadian tonight (bacon, mushroom, cheese, onion and ham) having already had the Mexican last night (peppers, chicken and sweet corn).
We return to the B&B at about 7.30pm after being out all day and on our feet for nearly all of it. We tell ourselves that we might go out again – back to the Pancake Bakery for desert or to the bar we went to last night again – once we’ve rested up a bit. But in the end we’re happy just resting and having a night in – we realise it’s the first time we’ve had a ‘proper’ night in for a long time! So instead we watch a couple of episodes of 2012 and then head to bed.
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