Our Wonderful Amsterdam City Break
My wife and I had a particularly special occasion this year - our silver wedding anniversary. And to celebrate, we were determined to take a luxury city break - really pull out all the stops and enjoy ourselves and that's what we did. Only thing was where to go? After much deliberating, we decided on the Dutch capital, Amsterdam.
I had visited the city once before, but my wife had never so a city break to Amsterdam was the ideal option. There are many things to see and do in Amsterdam and our itinerary was a lengthy one. On our list was the Van Gogh Museum, Anne Frank Huis, the Heineken Brewery and we wanted to take a look at the red light district just to see if it was as crazy as everyone said.
The Dutch are very laid back and friendly while at the same time they can come across as quite abrupt. They do not suffer fools gladly and their English is near perfect. All this makes you feel quite at home (at least for English speakers).
Our first stop was at the Van Gogh Museum in the Museum district if the city. The collection is housed in an ultra modern building which showcases the works splendidly. The museum is home to the largest collection of Van Goghs in the world and most of the favourites are here. Indeed one can spend a good half day just wandering the rooms here. A very pleasurable experience indeed.
We booked tickets for one of the long canal boats. It's a great way to see the city in style and the drivers and guides are invariably well informed and multi-lingual. This method of transport allowed us to stop off at our other points of interest along the way. The red light district is truly a weird and wonderful place. At night it is extremely seedy and unwelcoming however, during the day it feels quite safe and is filled with tourists.
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