a quick trip to Amsterdam
by: Norman J. Olson
I guess that of all the places I have been, my favorite is the country called The Netherlands… the people are tall, intelligent, friendly, practical, industrious and have a country that seems to work without the evils of poverty and crime which blight so much of this planet… the architecture is interesting, the public transit excellent, and the light is as gorgeous as trees disappearing in the mist… their dedication to the bicycle as a mode of transportation gives their society a health and vigor that is just a delight to share… a country famous for flowers, bicycles and great art, and a country where the national food is the pannekoeken… what is not to like????
on Sunday we decided to go to Amsterdam to see the spring flowers… especially the famous tulip display in the Keukenhof which is open for two months every spring… so we got out of MSP on a beautiful Airbus 330 and after 8 hours, a couple of great meals, a movie and a few hours sleep flew down through the billowy white clouds to land a Schipol airport (AMS) near Amsterdam… we had found that there is a bus directly to the Keukenhof from Schipol, so we put our bags in a locker, paid twenty three euros each for the combination ticket which included entrance to the park and bus fare and headed out across the flat Dutch countryside for Lisse where the Keukenhof is located… it was maybe a twenty minute ride… and fun to see the neat Dutch farms with the fields all tilled and ready for planting, or coming up with green… here and there a farm tractor working the fields and the neat farm houses, made of brick with lace curtains… when we neared the Keukenhof, we could see fields in the distance of red and yellow tulips…
the park is large enough that it took us about four hours to walk all through and around it… inside the entrance is one of those weird giant music box/calliope deals playing away and then one walks into the park which is tall with huge old looking trees and bed after bed of gorgeous flowers in all the bright reds and blues one could imagine… from the deepest blue of the hyacinths with their heady sweet smell to the fiery red and yellow stripes of the fanciest tulips and every shade in between… the flowers were everywhere… the guy at the tourist information office in the airport said that this was a terrific spring for the flowers and I cannot imagine the Keukenhof looking any better… it was warm and sunny, temps in the high 60s then low 70s… with just a hint of that fresh off the ocean breeze that seems to sweep clear across the Netherlands…
there were many people there from all over the world, but the park is so big that the paths never seemed crowded and maybe two of every three people were Dutch… we had a waffle with whipped cream and strawberries from a stand by the old windmill and stopped to sit here and there to enjoy the people and the flowers…. to watch the swans or just to bask in the warm sun… Keukenhof is just an amazing experience and felt so beautiful and fresh… I cannot recommend it strongly enough….
by about three in the afternoon, we had spent four hours enjoying the park and were getting tired and kind of walked out… so we took the bus back to AMS, retrieved our bags and took the train to the central station… we had reserved a very cheap hotel in he middle of the tourist area about three blocks from the central station… a very small room but it had an en suite bathroom… the sheets were clean and the bed was soft… so we crashed out for about 14 hours, getting over jet lag and making up for lost sleep the night before… I never seem to sleep well on airplanes…
Tuesday morning, we had a nice English breakfast, two of those weird English sausages, two fried eggs, beans (like Campbells pork and beans) which the British just love for breakfast and toast… then we bought a twenty four hour tram pass and took the tram to the Rijksmuseum…
I have only been to the Rijksmuseum once before and that was several years ago… how lucky we are to see all of that amazing art… the centerpiece of their collection is of course, the amazing Night Watch painted by Rembrandt… which truly is a beautiful and every way masterful piece of work… there is always a crowd around it and it seems to hold its place as an object to be seen with grace and dignity… I think Rembrandt would be pleased with how his painting looks all these years down the road… and with all of the joy people get from looking at it… of course, along with the Night Watch, the Rijksmuseum has four paintings by Jan Vermeer… and many smaller works by Rembrandt, including the famous picture I remember from the cigar box covers of Dutch Masters Cigars…
the gorgeous little Vermeers are as lovely and calm as one would imagine from the reproductions… and if it is true that a scientifically minded guy has perfectly recreated a Vermeer with a camera, well, good for him… the world can use more such lovely and tranquil objects to ponder and dream with…
the museum also has a Goya that is very fine… a simple… almost off hand portrait of a man but just a fine fine piece of painting if you like Goya (which, most of us do, I think)… besides these favorites, there are many many lovely Dutch landscapes and seascapes… by all of the well known masters of those genres… and sumptuous still lifes all of which display the verisimilitude of those 17th 18th and 19th century painters who looked at and painted their world to such beautiful effect…
in the mid afternoon, we had a soda and a coffee in the fancy restaurant on the first floor of the museum and then we looked at the room of ship models… from childhood, I have loved models of sailing ships… I used to try and make models from plastic kits but never really had the patience to make them come out right… but those old models are so amazing… some three or four feet long with every mast and spar, every block and rope done to the finest detail… some with threadbare sails hanging from the yardarms… they are so beautiful and interesting to look at and study…
after the ship models, we looked at the doll houses upstairs… which are quite as amazing and detailed as the ship models with tiny fragile furniture and dishes…
then we had a snack from one of the stalls along the canal in front of the museum… sitting in the sun… it was a very fine day with high puffy clouds and the sun bright in between…
then we took the tram to Dam Square and walked a mile or so through the city to Anne Frank’s house, which we had never visited and Mary wanted very much to see… there was a bit of a line and I sat and sketched passersby while Mary did the tour… which she very much enjoyed but found as she expected that it was very sad as well…we then found a Turkish restaurant where we had a delicious dinner for about 14 euros eating at a table on the sidewalk, across from a huge church which supposedly has the most famous steeple in Amsterdam… and it was a very nice spot for dinner and a very nice dinner…. since it was still light for an hour or so yet, and we had our tram passes, we picked a tram at random and rode to the end of the line, just to see a bit of the city beyond the central tourist district… when we got toward the end of the line, of course, we saw less shops and many large blocks of lower rent apartments where ordinary people seemed to live… the closer in and older traditional Amsterdam houses seemed very nice but are probably more expensive… but even out of the central city, along the side of the road there are bicycle roads and even out at the end of the line one saw many many cyclists… and it was fun to see families out walking in the evening in the parks… and children playing in the many playgrounds…
that evening, we went for a long walk through the famous red light district… yes, there are nearly naked prostitutes in the store windows… a sight which seems a bit regressive in a country as liberated as The Netherlands, where women are seen working with men as equals everywhere… it struck me as sort of old fashioned, like seeing an old Playboy magazine… but there were also lots of restaurants and shops, some porno shops, some selling cheese and wooden shoes… it was still warm with just a hint of chill in the air and a perfect night for walking… with tons of people everywhere, tourists from all over the world… I saw a what appeared to be a Japanese family group in one of the porno shops laughing and joking about the dildos…
the city is very nice to walk in, getting to the end of a warm spring day, looking at the tall thin old brick houses… the lights and neon reflected in the canals as you walk up over a little humped bridge… all the happy faces of people out for a good time, laughing voices and couples everywhere arm in arm… youth and energy in the air… plus a hint of hemp from the coffeeshops…
after a good sleep, we had breakfast at the same place as the day before… a bit later, we walked across the street where they were selling canal tours… 9 euros for an hour…. we had checked out of our hotel and had our bag with… I asked the sales person if I could take the bag on the boat and he said “no, but you can leave it there” pointing to the front of his booth… I said, “somebody might take it.” He said, “why would anyone want to steal your dirty clothes?” this seemed to make so much sense, that I left the bag there and off we went for a very nice relaxing ride along the canals… we marveled at the thousands of bicycles tied up on every fence and bridge… it was fun to see the houseboats, some fancy and brightly painted, some looking pretty run down… but all with crisp lace curtains and potted plants, in some cases, pot plants, growing forest like on every boat… we looked at the tall narrow old brick houses and the churches… saw a tower which we were told used to be called Crazy Jack because the clock kept crazy time… and toward the end of the ride right in front of the train station we saw a lovely ornate building with a terrace facing the canal that was a light restaurant…
so, after I retrieved my bag (turns out nobody did want my dirty clothes) we went to that restaurant and had a pannekoeken with cane sugar syrup and whipped cream and a soda again sitting in the warm sun, this about two in the afternoon… we looked across the water at the old church, or was it the slightly less old “new church”… a huge church of blackened stone… sitting tranquilly above broad steps…
then we walked across the street to the station, spent our last 8 euros on two tickets to Schipol and took the train to the airport… we caught the five pm flight back to MSP… I was in a middle seat, so could not look out but there were hundreds of movies to pick from so, I watched four movies, ate a couple more great meals and after 8 hours in the air, we were back home… and glad to see most of the snow melted here in Minnesota (although a big snow storm is supposed to be coming in tomorrow morning-yikes)
lovely read Norman