I may or may not have taken a couple of them for later...
We had to hurry up and eat, though, because we had to hurry up and get moving! We were out of the hotel by 8am - yes, not the most relaxing vacation. But, we'll sleep when we're dead, right?
We decided that we could just walk everywhere in Amsterdam, and not worry about getting tram tickets.
Ok, I lie....the tram ticket counter wasn't open yet (why the heck would they be closed until 10am on a Saturday!?). Really, we fully planned on walking TO all of our destinations, but we wanted to get a tram ride BACK to the hotel after we were done. That didn't happen. But we'll get to that later.
First up - the Anne Frank house, which was about a mile and a half away. One our way there, we noticed a TON of city workers, cleaning up the streets. Lemme tell ya - the streets were disgusting. Trash EVERYWHERE (and more than one pile of vom - gross). Workers were picking up trash, street sweeping, street washing, washing down store fronts. I can't even imagine how disgusting it would be if they didn't have so many people cleaning up. The amount of trash was worse than New Years Day in Munich.
But really, once we got further away from the train station, and the RLD district, it definitely got cleaner. Then we got to the Anne Frank house. There was already a small line formed, but it wasn't bad. The museum took up the buildings next to the house, but then the warehouse with the secret annex was right next door.
Before we went in to the house, we watched a short movie. That's one thing I really liked about this museum. Every couple of rooms, there would be a screen playing interviews from people associated with the Frank family (friends of the family, the people that helped them in hiding, and even Otto Frank - Anne's father).
One thing I couldn't get over was how tiny every room and corridor was, but it all added up to one huge building. The size of the place was definitely hard to comprehend, and even after having walked thru it - I'm still pretty confused about the layout (especially since we walked through a bunch of other rooms that weren't part of the original warehouse, but were now used as part of the museum).
Unfortunately we couldn't take pictures in the place. I wish we had, although I'm not sure a photo could have captured the feelings of the place. It was amazing how tiny and steep the staircases were (thankfully we went back down thru the museum, which had a modern staircase. I don't know how I would have made it down the way we came, with my ankle being a useless pile of metal).
The most amazing thing was seeing how well-preserved the bedrooms were. The Frank room still had pencil marks of Anne & Margot's heights on the wall. That was a shock to see. Then, you walk into Anne & Margot's bedroom, and you see all of the pictures of movie stars that Anne herself pasted up when they moved in. (this was all under protective glass) It was definitely moving.
The most moving was probably watching the interview with Otto (Anne's dad). He was the only survivor from the house, and seeing him speak about it was....well, you'll just have to go there to see it for yourself. This is definitely a place I think everyone should see once in their lifetime.
But do me a favor - read her diary first. The number of people that were going thru the place that had no clue about it was astounding.
I'm about 90% sure that the building to the right of the building with the red shutters is the original warehouse with the secret annex, and the three buildings to the right are part of the museum. (It's either the building to the right of the red shutter house, or the one right next to that...I told you - it was confusing!)
Next up - our Blue Boat canal tour that was included with our LivingSocial package. This was about another mile. By this point, I was ready to sit down! Thankfully the canal tour was 75 minutes long - a good break if you ask me! :)
I have to say, I really really liked this boat tour. SO MUCH BETTER than taking one of those stupid bus tours that Josh and I tend to take. Plus, the narration was actually really informative (and the good thing is - it wasn't constant, so you didn't have to always be "engaged").
One thing I loved to do was check out all the houseboats on the canal. I just think it would be so awesome to live on a houseboat. Of course I'm sure it sounds way more romantic than it actually is...but a girl can dream, can't she?
Another fun thing to do was check out all of the different types of gables (building tops). Some of them also had a beam with a hook jutting out from the top - these were typically just for the poorer houses. It was for a pulley system to move goods up to the attic (or also just moving furniture in). Chances are the REALLY rich people had their own storage houses elsewhere, so they didn't need a pulley system.
Now, this one really shocked us. You see all of the rows and rows and rows of narrow houses. What you don't see, is that many of the houses (esp. in the rich areas) have huge gardens in back. The inside of the squares are literally full of parks, trees, benches, etc. etc. etc. What I would have given to be able to see some of those parks!! It looks so metropolitan (well, 16th century metropolitan) and non-green, that I find it hard to believe there is that much green space hidden away. We did end up seeing an aerial map of the town at the Rembrandt house, and sure enough, you can see all of the green space in back of many of the houses. Amazing.
It was nice to get the break in walking, but it was time to get moving again. We hadn't really planned on going to the Van Gogh museum, but we were so nearby (about half a mile) that we decided we might as well just do it.
We passed by the famous "I amsterdam" sign, but there were waaaayyy too many people to get a really good shot.
But we tried.
The Van Gogh museum was in a very nice park area. It would have been great to go sit out there in the summer, and people watch. Even so, it was still fun to people watch. Except at this point we were starving, and it was cold and windy. (which means I was cranky)
The museum is much bigger than it looks in the photo (plus, that's just one section of it).
We get to the museum, round the corner, and realize that we probably should have pre-booked tickets (except we didn't even know we were going there for sure). I wasn't expecting quite so many people, but it only took us twenty minutes to get through - and it gave us a chance to scarf down some jerky (for Josh) and chex mix while standing in line. And, at least we had a group of high-as-hell Spanish guys in front of us for entertainment.
At this point, I feel the need to extol the virtues of the coat check. We weren't allowed to bring in our camera or backpack, but we also checked our coats.
I don't know what it is, but being able to shed yourself from the shackles of tourist paraphernalia is liberating. I never took my purse anywhere on this trip, but whatever I needed went in the backpack (along with all the camera equipment). I was already having mini heart palpitations throughout the day because I thought I forgot my purse somewhere, but now being without the backpack AND coats pushed my mini heart palpitations into full on heart palpitations.
Don't care - totally worth it to not have to lug that crap around anymore, for at least a couple hours.
The museum itself was good. It went through Van Gogh's entire life as an artist (which really was only 9 years or so). There was a lot of personal information about him, but unfortunately, I feel like they really sugar coated his life. I wanted to hear the nitty gritty about his ear, his relationship with Gauguin, and all the other craziness that was Van Gogh. But that's really just because I like dirt. ;)
I did really like the museum, but at this point, I was just so sore and hungry and tired. Josh likes to be verrrrry thorough when it comes to looking at paintings - he will read every single description of every single piece of artwork. I typically read maybe 70%. So, by the time he was ready to go, I was reallly ready to go.
We decided that we would stop by a pub or something on the way back from the museum to the hotel. From the Van Gogh to the hotel was another 2 miles. Oy. Why why why didn't we get a tram ticket?!?
We did get to walk through the antique store district, which was really neat. At first we were looking for places to stop, but halfway through the walk back, I think we both just decided to hurry up and get to the hotel. I was afraid if I stopped, I wouldn't want to start up again. My ankle was doing well, but I didn't want to test it any further. There are a lot of directional signs in Amsterdam, listing the highlights of the city and how far away they are. I think that was the only thing keeping me going - seeing the distance to the Central Station (near the hotel) diminishing with every block.
Finally, after what felt like hours, we saw the Central Station in the distance! We KNEW that the hotel was right there! I could have run the rest of the way.
As soon as we got into our hotel room, off went the shoes, and I pounced on the sugar waffle like it was my long lost lover. That was the best damn waffle I've ever eaten. I think it was about 4:30pm at this point. Other than a hand full of chex mix, we hadn't eaten since 7:30am. And that was after walking allll day (minus the 75 minutes on the boat). All in all, we walked a minimum of 5 miles. I know it doesn't sound like a lot, but it was. At least for me, Mrs. Wuss.
Of course, we still had to go out later that night... Ugh.
The plan was to just go somewhere nearby the hotel. But...well, do y'all remember reading about our problem in Brugge? We're trying to find a restaurant that caters to us, while not being crazy expensive, that has something for both a meat-eater, and a vegetarian, that we're also both in the mood for. But at this point, I'm still cranky, and now I'm sore, and it's raining to boot.
Finding a restaurant just wasn't in the cards. Getting into a fight about finding a restaurant WAS, however.
We ended up snaking our way all through the Asian district, weed district, RLD, gay district. Got lost a couple times. Got cursed at in Dutch by a "homeless" man to whom we wouldn't give money.
Even though we were totally unsuccessful, and just ended up going back to the hotel to eat peanut butter sandwiches, it was still a nice time. I'm thankful for all the experiences Josh and I have. Not only do we get better and better at traveling, but it also helps in other areas, and helps us to get over persnickety fights waaaay easier & quicker.
By the time we got back to the hotel room, it was 10pm. After the pb sandwich, and a quick shower, we were down for the count. The DoubleTree hotel in Amsterdam doesn't have the most comfortable beds, but maaaaaaan, did we sleep good that night.
All in preparation to DO IT AGAIN on Sunday! Stay tuned for tomorrow's blog: Amsterdam - Part 3
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