Amsterdam is a popular destination of friend’s and family who come to see me. As it is a rather short distance from my home city, it is easy and cheap to travel to this city of canals and bicycles. To get to Amsterdam, it is best to check the train schedules as it is a pain to find a parking spot in Amsterdam: an expensive pain at that! Some parking structures will cost around 50,00 euro for the day! Thalys has daily high speed trains to downtown Amsterdam that usually will cost between 40-100 euro, depending on the time you purchase. It is always worth checking first class prices as sometimes they have promotions that make the fare very cheap!

 So welcome to Amsterdam! The city is best known for its numerous canals, home of Anne Frank, and of course, the legal use of drugs. But, there is so much more to the city than what meets the eye. Personal preference: Amsterdam is one of the most beautiful and charming cities in Europe. You can easily navigate around on foot, tram or the most popular, bicycle. You will not be able to take a photo without several bicycles in your shot and for the lazy American, is quite a site!

Amsterdam is also home to several important art galleries and museums: The Rembrandt house, Van Gogh and the ever important Rijksmuseum highlighting Dutch painters over the year.

The Rembrandt house lets visitors see the place where Rembrandt lived and worked for his life. Like all of the museums and galleries in Amsterdam, you can purchase your tickets online to skip the queue. I always recommend doing this any opportunity to fully maximize on your time in the city.

The Rijksmuseum  has just opened its doors in April 2013 after a 10 year renovation to update the buiding to match the modern era. Personal preference: this is the most influential and important museum to the history of Dutch art anywhere. It is often impossible to have the time for every museum in a city, but if you do have the time, do not miss this!

  The Anne Frank House is the most visited attraction in Amsterdam. If you do not pre book your tickets, you will expect to wait in a line for about 30-45 minutes before getting to go inside. On the link above, you can select the time and date of your visit that will allow you to walk to the front of the line.

This is also a must see!! It will not take more than one hour to go through and for those who have read the diary, it puts a very real picture into what the life was during that time for Anne and her family.

Now, Amsterdam has a lot of museums to offer but make sure you spend some time enjoying the social pleasures of the city! And yes, I do mean indulge in a space cake if it pleases you!  In Amsterdam, a Coffee Shop is a place to buy and enjoy a variety of marijuana substances. So, if you are looking for actual coffee, you are going to be sadly mistaken!! But, with any recreational item, use with caution and care 🙂 The Heineken brewery is also an option for the beer drinkers out there; but for 20,00 euros per ticket, i would rather spend that money on drinking actual Heineken at a pub across the street!

If you have the time, take a boat ride through the many canals of Amsterdam. There are many boat companies, but I prefer Lovers one hour boat tour that departs and returns at the main train station. They have many different options based on what you would like to do. This gives you a nice overview of the city and some historical information of each part of the city.

Here is your first Dutch lesson: Kaas = Cheese. And you must eat kaas while you are in Amsterdam. You will find many kaas shops in the city but my favorite is De Kaaskelder located near the floating flower market in downtown Amsterdam. They have so many different flavors, styles, cuts of kaas that anyone can find something to his/her taste.

So when to come to Amsterdam? There are many festivals and holidays that welcome many tourists so it is up to you if you are someone who likes crowds or prefers the quieter times. Other than the usual Catholic holidays and Christmas, King’s Day (April 27th) is a day to celebrate the country’s royal leader. It has been Queen’s day for the past 200 years and in 2014 marked the first year of the change to King’s Day with the succession of Queen Beatrice’s son, King Willem Alexander.