Amsterdam- Day 4

On our last morning in Amsterdam, the plan was to grab breakfast, drop our luggage in lockers at the train station, and soak in our last few hours.

Let's talk about breakfast. On the previous day, we had gone to a cafe near the apartment to eat, and it was so good that we had to go back again. The kids had muffins, and I think all of the adults had the medium breakfast. This included a hard boiled egg, sandwich with ham and cheese, croissant with butter and jam, and juice. Everything was delicious, but oh, the croissants. They were served just out of the oven, and were so flaky and buttery. We all agreed that they were the best we'd ever had.

We had taken a taxi from the airport when we'd arrived, and that was just a little easier than loading everything up on the tram and keeping track of the kids.

Once we dropped off the luggage, we just walked.

Can you see how the tops of the buildings tilt outward? The stairways are too narrow to allow large items like furniture to be carried up, so they use the hooks up top to hoist things to the upper floors. A cool little fact, although it was hard to get a good picture.

The buildings are all kinds of wonky

Look how the cars are just parked right on the edge! And they were so close together.

I love the canal pictures

Some buildings were barely wider than the entrance

You can see again here how the tops of the buildings angle out

We stopped for a snack of crepes and waffles

This guy was painting street scenes. We wanted to buy one, but he didn't have any that were dry.

We had a quick lunch at a burger place before heading back to the train station to collect our things.

More bicycle parking

This is part of the bike parking near the train station

Views from the train

And we were back at the airport, luckily without delays this time.

It was a fun time for only three nights!

Amsterdam - Day 3

AKA we wise up and start having more fun

Around this time, we realized that we needed to adjust our expectations, and that helped us to plan better. We also decided that public transportation was our friend, and that helped immensely. Also worth noting, this day was raining on and off and much cooler than the day before, which somehow made us more comfortable (feeling at home, maybe?).

So we grabbed a quick bite to eat and headed toward Het Scheepvaartmuseum (the National Maritime Museum).

Standin' on the corner, waitin' for the bus

The kids thought the moat was pretty cool

After their behavior at the Van Gogh Museum, I wasn't sure if the kids would be very interested in this museum. Luckily, they really enjoyed it, and we were able to spend a good deal of time exploring.

They especially liked the audio tour

One of the favorite areas was the map wing. There were many different maps from various points in history (I remember one was from 1482). It was really interesting to see what people thought the world looked like before we really knew.

This was a really cool and detailed world map from 1648.

This is where we live

Introducing... the island of California

This was a Chinese map from 1674

It showed different animals, and in the oceans, sea monsters. Miles and Lily spent lots of time searching for the creatures.

Next was a room with all sorts of decorations taken from old ships. (There's probably a name for these, but I don't know it.)

Don't blink

Then a room with the different navigational instruments. The kids weren't overjoyed with this part, but I think it was one of my Dad's favorites.

We breezed through a small art gallery, and the whale area...

... before heading outside to see a life-sized ship replica.

                  

Surgeon's cabin

Passengers' cabin. I had just read Voyager from the Outlander series, so I was fascinated with the tiny cabins.

Waiting while the grown ups hit the gift shop

Ahoy!

After spending the entire morning at the museum, it was time for lunch. We found a small pub-type place on a canal, and headed upstairs to eat.

And this open window was on the floor right next to our table, at perfect baby height. I was a bit nervous, and made sure the kids stayed at the table at all times.

Nice views, though

Some kind of veal croquettes with chips and cider

The picture above is bitterballen, a traditional Dutch food, served with mustard. It was really good!

After lunch, we decided to do a canal tour.  We just chose one that was nearby and hopped on.

Another audio tour

He looks so big here

An entire parking garage for bikes

It rained on and off throughout the tour

We opened the windows to take pictures, but had to be careful because water would pour in on poor Lily.

This is one of Matt's stealth pictures of me (his favorite)

Reguliersgracht- Seven Bridges

Hey, we were just there

Around back

It was a great tour, and we learned a lot about Amsterdam (although I couldn't tell you anything about it now). When we got off the boat, we wandered around just a bit.

Then we realized that it was a bit late, and rode the tram back to our neighborhood to find a place to have dinner. We ended up choosing an Asian restaurant on their opening day (we didn't know this until we had gone inside).

Pork belly sliders

Some kind of crispy chicken

Another slider with fried chicken

This was a nice beer

The food was good, I just don't think we ordered enough. But the kids were getting restless, so we headed home. At some point during our wandering, we stopped in a souvenir shop so the kids could pick something out. Lily chose wooden tulips ("so I can pretend to get married"), Miles chose a teddy bear, and Clara chose a little Dutch girl dolly.

Dutch apple pie for dessert

We did stop for dessert, and then all went to bed. The next day was the last day of our trip, and we wanted to get up early enough to walk around before we had to catch the train to the airport.