Day 1 - Amsterdam

We got to Amsterdam about 3:3o in the afternoon. We found the train that would take us to from Schipol Airport to Centraal Station. That was pretty tough because we didn't speak the language and while most people speak English, we didn't meet any of them in our first interaction.

We boarded the train and crossed our fingers that we were on the right one. Luckily, we were. When we got out, we thought we'd have no problem catching a cab to our hotel. We must have exited the wrong side of the station because we saw one cab. We grabbed it before anyone else had the chance. Our cab driver wore a suit and tie. My initial thought was that this had been someones hired car and he was doing us a favor by taking us to our hotel. But that wasn't the case. All the cab drivers there wore a suit.

We stayed at the Grand Amrath Hotel not too far from the station. Our hotel used to be a shipping house and it was built in 1928 and is supposed to be in the shape of a ship. The bow points to the Centraal Station.
Grand Amrath Hotel - Amsterdam.

The six shipping companies that did business here have since gone out of business. In 2007, this building was opened as a luxury hotel. Our room was really nice. I think the hotel got the idea right. There was a mini bar - all items were free and replenished each morning. If you drank the vodka and you wanted another that evening, you'd have to pay for it. Still, the first round was on them. We also had free wireless Internet. THAT was awesome. The only thing not included was breakfast.
Our room at the Grand Amrath.
View from our room.
John looking out the window of our hotel.

We were on the floor 1. The ground floor here is called floor 0. We were up on the next floor, which was floor 1. They had a lower level floor that was called the -1 floor. Seriously.

When we got there, we ventured out a bit to walk around and try to get oriented. I couldn't use my iPhone to navigate around like I usually do. We had to do it the old fashioned way, which was to use a map. That took me a while as I have NO sense of direction.
John was going to navigate initially.

We stopped at a cafe near our hotel for dinner. Food here is expensive.
Ahhh...a nice glass of wine after being on a plane for 12 hours. What a way to start a vacation.
Night view of the canal by our hotel.

On our first full day there we slept until noon. I guess we were pretty beat from the plane ride. We got up and our first order of business was to see the Anne Frank House. I'd re-read The Diary of Anne Frank in preparation for our trip. It was kind of a long hike (we walked) but we made it over there.

Based on what I'd been led to believe, our line was really short. We waited about 20 minutes. When we got in, the curators made me carry my backpack to the front. Also, no photographs inside the museum. We went up to the secret annex the same way that Anne and her family did 66 years before. The staircase was very steep.

The first room was the room that Anne's parents shared with her sister, Margot. Anne's room was next. It still had all of her pictures of movie stars behind Plexiglas. There was no furniture. If there had been, I don't think there would have been room for any people to walk through.

There was a WC that they were not allowed to use during the day because there were actually people working in the building that were unaware that the families were upstairs. They couldn't go out and get any fresh air and they couldn't make any noise during the day. They lived this way for two years before they were betrayed to the Nazis.
Building that housed the Frank & Van Pels families while they were in hiding.
Statue of Anne Frank.
It was a very sobering visit and it made me really appreciate my life.

After the Anne Frank House, we went for a bit of lunch. We've found that Europeans, in general, do not do breakfast. When we were in Paris and in Rome, there was a croissant and yogurt but never bacon & eggs or even just toast.
We ate at the Pancake Bakery, which came highly recommended in the Frommer's. The pancakes here are not like what you get at home. They are more like crepes. They put different things into the pancakes. Mine came with mushrooms and onions, which was really good. John got cheese, mushrooms, onions and ham.
My pancake.

On the table, was this big bowl of something that looked like syrup. I put a little on my plate to dip in and it was good. It wasn't quite like syrup that we get at home.
Syrup for the 'pancake'

After lunch we decided to take a relaxing canal tour. This was an interesting perspective from which to view the city. On the canal homes, the stairs were so narrow that it was impossible to bring furniture to the upper floors. So the homeowners would use the hoist and pulley to bring the furniture in through the window.
Examples of homes along the canal that have the hoist for bringing in furniture through the window.

The gables on the canal homes hid the roof from the public and helped identify the homes. House numbers weren't introduced until 1795. The more ornate the gable, the easier it was to recognize. There are four main types of gables: the spout gable with diagonal lines and semi circle windows or shutters which was used mainly for warehouses from 1600's to 1700's; the step gable that was popular from 1580 - 1660; the neck gable, which resembled a bottle spout and was introduced in the 1640's; and the bell gable which became popular in the 18th century.
Examples of some of the gables along the canal tour.

Houseboats are hugely popular. Everyone wants to live along the canal and people are willing to pay. The houseboats are linked to the city sewer system and go as high as 1,700,000 Euros. As we were gliding along, I thought most of these were kind of shabby. I could only imagine what they look like on the inside. The houseboats are permanently docked.

Some of the houseboats along the canal.
Sea Palace Chinese Restaurant. The floating restaurant.
Noorderkerk - Calvanist church dating from 1623.
St. Nicolaaskerk - built in 1887. Catholic church.

After the tour, we stopped at a restaurant, also recommended by the Frommer's to make reservations for our dinner. Since it was our 10 year anniversary dinner, we decided to pick something nice.
John & Angela Chaney - 10 year anniversary.

Dinner was fabulous. It was a great first day.