Day 2 of our I Amsterdam tourist binge was all about canal houses and museums. We spent all day out and about, and had a great time visiting some really cool places – sweet!
Today we started out on the right foot with a trip to McDonalds. In my experience, it is actually pretty hard to find decent lunch food in Amsterdam that doesn’t involve fighting for a table and sitting there for 2 hours. We wanted something cheap and fast, and the Golden Arches were there to deliver!
Our first stop was the Van Loon Museum. This place is a very well preserved and restored 17th century canal house that still belongs to an old, wealthy merchant family. Noelle and I love visiting old houses like this. They offer a really cool glimpse into what life was like way back when (albeit a very rich and aristocratic life!) These big merchant houses were all set up in a similar layout; grand entryway, big curving staircases, lots of rooms upstairs, kitchen in the basement, and a beautiful garden leading to the carriage house. Van Loon has all of that on display!
We also visited the Geelvink Hinlopen House, and the Willet House. Both had more beautiful gardens, and some cool rooms to explore. I would vote Van Loon as the best of the three, but with the I Amsterdam card, we were just glad to see all of them without paying for each entrance.
Noelle took some cool panoramas with her iPhone too:
Also on the list was the Tassenmuseum Hendrikje (Museum of Bags and Purses). I suppose it is a little odd that I can be extremely interested in the inner workings of an old, greasy VW engine one week, and then find myself still mildly amused by the progression of styles and materials used in 17th and 18th century fashion… I suppose I should find it even more odd that Noelle is also extremely interested in the purses, but also mildly amused by the VW engine. We’re just crazy I guess!
After an enthralling morning walking around the houses and museums, we found ourselves in the middle of yet another open air market, this time in Waterlooplein. These markets are cool, but after almost two months of Amsterdam living, I’m starting to feel the pull of a well stocked Target.
We hit up Rembrandt’s house for our final museum stop before heading to dinner. This was essentially another house museum, that also included some works from the artist. They also had a decent workshop demonstration set-up. The place was a little more crowed than the other stops, and we were definitely losing steam by this point. We decided to head to Leidseplein to find some grub!
First we stopped in at the Pipe Museum outside of the square. I was expecting the museum to be some hokey little place with a bunch of your typical Amsterdam = weed type stuff, but it turned out to be a huge collection of smoking pipes dating from way back b.c. to today. It was interesting to see the change in materials and styles, and our guide was very keen to make sure we saw each and every one!
After getting a thorough education on tobacco smoking through the ages, we ended up back at De Zotte, the brown cafe we ate at a few weeks ago.
A couple hours of drinking 8% alcohol beers, eating large amounts of bread, cheese, fries, and spare ribs, we headed off to the Van Gogh museum. It’s open until 10 on Fridays; we had tried to go earlier in our trip, but found the line was too long. This time there was almost no line, and the entrance free was covered with the I Amsterdam card – sweet!
After wandering the floors of the museum and taking in the many colorful paintings, we were just about totally exhausted. A quick tram ride back to the Jordaan and we were off to bed. Hopefully we will have enough energy for Day 3!
