Amsterdamn

Not a misspell…just a feeling, since this would be the last day of our journey through Belgium and The Netherlands.

Sailing into Amsterdam, from the harbor to its 165 canals brings back memories of many, many years past when Marsha and I first discovered this wonderfully diverse and eclectic city.

The first order of business was to hop onto a canal boat to get a feel for what’s going on in the more than 60 miles of intracity waterways. Besides bustling commercial, commuter, and tourist activity we were really struck by the sheer number and styles of houseboats, from really simple to elaborate, custom-built floating homes.

Most or the houseboats were beautifully maintained with decks and flower (and vegetable) gardens, and open views into the cleverly engineered and designed inner spaces of the homes. We passed the area where seven bridges could be seen in a straight line (sorry about the reflections from the canal boat windows). Nearly 1,300 bridges, many of them drawbridges, make for good excuses for being late to work (sorry…the bridge was up). The canals range from tiny and one way – hardly able to navigate the canal boat through – to expansive waterways.

Many of the huge number of 16th-17th-18th century houses line the canals. These mostly brick canal houses show off their distinctive stepped gables and forward slanting design. Huge fires in the wooden structures of the 15th century assured that brick would be used from then on. The “lean” of the narrow houses assured more room in the upper floors and allowed for heavy furniture to be hoisted cleanly from the beams (with block and tackle) at the top of the structures.

And, what would any tour of Amsterdam be without a look at the still burgeoning diamond industry, although we could probably have done without, based on it’s pretty checkered history.

After another delicious and too much to say no to – lunch back on the boat, we decided to walk into the center of town, and on advice of the concierge, find the tram that would take us to our favorite, the Rijksmuseum. It was bloody hot, so hot that we decided to stop in at the cool (both meanings) Basilica of Saint Nicholas located in the Old Centre district, very close to Amsterdam’s beautiful main railway station. St, Nicholas is the patron saint of both the church and the city of Amsterdam. The basilica is the city’s primary Roman Catholic church.

The unusual heat was well into the 90s with full sun, but we trudged on from shadow to shadow toward the train station.

Around the corner from the Basilica we found this extremely busy street full of bars, restaurants, and rows of “head” shops…yes it is Amsterdam. The entire area was decked out in Pride flags and paraphernalia, and bursting with joyous people having a lot of fun – even in the heat.

We continued on, trying desperately to find the most direct route to the rail station. It was an almost impossible task with levels of roadway that became “autos only” or “bicycles only” or went underground or over bridges preventing us pedestrians from reaching the station – literally right in our line of sight. We finally guessed right and found the tram stop in front of the station. We were dripping sweat from our skin and clothing. After 20 minutes, no #2 or #12 tram arrived and it was getting close to museum closing time. Couldn’t even get an Uber as we were in a no auto zone and couldn’t tell them where to pick us up! Some things are just not meant to be.

So we headed back to the cool comfort of our little river boat, only to almost jump out of our skin from the horn of this enormous Holland America ocean going vessel, a reminder of our personal vowel to never sail on a ship that holds more people than our home city! We waved politely as they ponderously drifted by. 178 people on our boat seemed even more like a nice, friendly neighborhood.

Too soon…we packed our bags for an early start to the airport the next day for our direct flight back to Philly.

Farewell to The Netherlands and Belgium…and farewell to you. We’ve really enjoyed sharing our journey and adventures with you – as always. Where next? Maybe you have some good ideas you’d like to share? We’re thinking, perhaps, Scotland. We’ve seen some interesting, in-depth offerings that are beginning to stir our built in travel genes. Let’s see what happens. We’ll let you know. In the meantime, safe travels to all!

Marsha & Joel