Old Retired Guy Blog

June 25 - 28, 2010

Sunset on the canals
of Amsterdam.

Click on any of the photos
to enlarge the image.

Return to the
Old Retired Guy Blog Index

Amsterdam (Page 1 of 3)

Note: This is part 1 of the authorized edition of The Anderson's European Vacation, not to be confused with National Lampoon's European Vacation.

*     *     *     *     *

Flying from west to east you always lose a lot of time.  In our case, seven hours.  So, the night was very short and when our flight landed in Amsterdam it was 7:30 AM.  We emerged from the Airbus 330 and followed the crowd into Schiphol Airport.  After finding our bags, we went to customs.  We were neither frisked nor scanned.  The customs guy simply looked at our passports, looked at us, and then stamped the passports.  We were free to enter the Netherlands.  Actually, we were free to enter the entire European Union.

We caught a tram that took us to within a couple blocks of our hotel.  Then we crossed a canal and rumbled down a cobblestone street to find The Keizershof Hotel.  Our room was on the 4th floor.  Since Europeans count differently than Americans, this was to us the 5th floor.  It was reached by ascending 4 very narrow winding flights of stairs (total stair count = 60).  We knew this ahead of time because the owner explained everything before we reserved it.  We thought it would be an adventure.  It was.

My knowledge of the Netherlands is just as good as any other American's.  I clearly recall the disaster narrowly averted by that heroic little boy with his finger in the dike (we could use him in the Gulf of Mexico right now)!  And who doesn't remember the athletic prowess of the incredible Hans Brinker and his silver skates?

So, it was no surprise to see canals in Amsterdam.  But, man, there are canals everywhere!  According to a local, there are over 100 kilometers of them; that's ... hmmm, let me see, multiply by 5, divide by 8, take the square root, add pi ... I think about 62 miles!  The result is a city with something like 90 islands and 1500 bridges.  (This is good stuff.  I should be a tour guide.) 

We toured the city on the canals and I was constantly amazed at the ability of the captain to negotiate 90-degree turns in the narrow waterways.  Other boats were usually present, which made it even more of a challenge.  Some of the turns would have been completely blind had it not been for large wide-angle mirrors hanging under some of the bridges.  In the evening and on the weekend the canals were filled with people of all ages just cruising around -- happy families, partying teenagers, lovey-dovey couples.

The canals aren't just for cruising, many locals make their home on them.  According to Jurjen Heeck's Houseboat Page, about 2400 families live in houseboats on the canals in Amsterdam.  Many of these are connected to city services, so they can be very comfortable though not readily moveable.  The city does not allow new permits for houseboats so they are no longer a cheap place to live.

  
(Left) A tour boat glides through the canals.
(Right) This guy's watering his houseboat garden.

Of course, there's also a lot of interesting stuff on the land between the canals.  The streets are lined with sidewalk cafes.  It doesn't get dark until about 11 PM, so they're a great place to hang out and have a beer on a warm summer evening.  Since the World Cup was in progress, most of the sidewalk cafes had televisions set up outside so their patrons wouldn't go somewhere else to watch the games.

The residential areas are packed with quaint houses that are centuries old.  They're narrow because the taxes for waterfront properties used to be based on the width of the property.  Some of the old houses look a bit crooked.  I'm not sure if they were built that way or if subsidence played a role.

'Amsterdam'
Next Page