21 May: Copenhagen to Amsterdam

When I was in primary school, we did a class project on Holland. We learned all about tulips, barges, dykes, clogs, and windmills. We cooked cinnamon biscuits and learned how to count to ten in Dutch. Thankfully, we didn’t learn anything about what Amsterdam is really famous for.

Our mission is to enjoy Amsterdam and avoid the red light district. Maybe I’m being paranoid? Or maybe I’ve read too many websites having googled ‘what to do in Amsterdam’ and concluding from that if you haven’t come here to smoke pot then you’re wasting your time (bad pun – sorry!).

Having said all that, we did manage to enjoy our first afternoon. We found the place where we are staying fairly easily, and picked up a few brochures on the way. It seems most of the attractions have esaily obtainable vouchers for significant discounts – for instance, we opted to buy tickets for a hop-on-hop-off boat and bus tour, for 48 hours, for 36 Euro instead of 70. Having done that we rode one of the routes around some of the various canals, which gave us a good overview of the city (geographically and historically).

You might remember my photo from a couple of days ago, of all the bikes outside the train station at Copenhagen. Here in Amsterdam they have built a 3-4 storey high bike garage that has a capacity to hold 2,500 bikes, and it’s not enough – they estimate there are some 9,500 bikes that are parked near the station every day. Amsterdam has a population of around 740,000 inhabitants, and a bicycle population of 550,000. On top of that, 50,000 bicycles are stolen every year in Amsterdam alone.