Travelling from our Flitwick, U.K. home, Amsterdam is a 45 minute flight from the nearby Luton Airport, so except for the usual airport stuff it is a simple trip. To make this the most efficient possible we rose at three AM, took a taxi to the airport, boarded a 6:15 AM flight, arrived at Schipol Airport at 8:00, having lost an hour in time zone, and spent the rest of the day touristing in Amsterdam. Logistics and convenience led us to stay near the central station in a Crown Plaza Hotel.

As in all modern and sane countries, the Dutch train system is integrated with the air travel system, one can walk off the airplane, walk onto a train, and within a few minutes be on the way to anywhere in Europe. Compared with Schipol Airport, in terms of travel convenience and efficiency, Los Angeles International Airport is a total disgrace. A train took us directly from the airport to the central station in less than half an hour for a few dollars. From there, with help of the trams, water buses, and tour boats, one owns Amsterdam with easy access to everything in and around the city. In fact, one can walk all over Amsterdam.

My first blunder was reading a traffic light incorrectly. Being familiar with traffic lights that tell you how much time you have to cross, I was not prepared to be told how long I have to wait. Fortunately an alert motorist had good brakes and a kind heart. After that I took nothing for granted.

With good fortune, the hotel allowed us to check in at 9 AM and we immediately headed for a canal tour to give us a good overall look at the city. This is definitely the best, most efficient way to get a first overall look and is the second best deal in the city, next to the tram system.

After the canal tour we set out on foot to visit some of the sites we had seen from the canals. Our first stop was the old cathedral at Dam Square. After that visit we strolled around the small side streets in the direction of Anne Frank’s house.

Reflections in a chandelier inside the cathedral. There are so many things to photograph and paint.

The Amsterdam canal system layout simplifies orientation and one need never get lost. There are five canals that roughly form concentric semicircles about the central station. All one has to do is identify which canal one is nearest to know where one is. Regardless of where you are the scenery is great. I haven’t found a street in Amsterdam that isn’t interesting.

The Damrak Street, the main street of Amsterdam, runs directly out from the station, dividing the semicircles roughly in half. The tourist attractions can all be located with this information. For example, the red light district is on the first canal north of the Damrak, the flower market is on the first canal just to the south of the Damrak, the main church and Dam Square are on the Damrak before you get to the first canal, Anne Frank’s house is on the fourth canal South of the Damrak,The Rijksmuseum and the Van Gogh are just beyond the fifth canal, and so on. You can walk over this area easily or you can hop on the trams and ride. You can even access most of these by canal bus.

Damrak Street, the main street, looking towards the central station at the end of the street. All the trams come back to here, so you can never get lost.

From the central station we strolled along Damrak Street to the Dam Square, where people collect in groups and entertain each other. Surrounding this square are the King’s palace, the largest cathedral, and the famous Hotel Grand Krasnopolski. The red-light district is located just behind the hotel.

Typical architecture in Amsterdam. Every canal is different in its own way. Some with churches, many with beautiful bridges and reflections. The houses gradually sink, leaving many of them tilted and misaligned with others.

The Netherlands is a flat and very crowded country, which makes it ideal for bicycling. The Dutch travel around their cities mostly by bicycle, because cars are just too inconvenient. Being a pedestrian in Amsterdam is challenging and even dangerous at times. A pedestrian must cross bike trails, tram tracks, and car streets. Regardless of care taken, sooner or later you have a close call with one of the other transportation competitors, most likely a bicycle, which can appear out of nowhere at a goodly speed. Bikes compete not only for transportation space, but also parking and walking spaces. They even ride bikes when the streets are covered with ice and snow.

Amsterdam’s favorite and most practical transportation mode. Bicycles take up a lot of the room in both the transportation corridors and the sidewalks.

The Singel Canal. This is the first of five semicircular canals with the central station at the center. I sat and painted this scene.

Street Art on the way to the flower market. I haven’t found a street in Amsterdam that isn’t interesting.

Amsterdam’s red light district is a fascinating tourist attraction. There is nothing like it anywhere else in the world. Although many European cities have red light districts, none is like this one. Pauline had many hesitations about wandering into this district since she had never seen such a thing before. Isn’t this something just for men? Is it dangerous? Is it dirty and shameful? The red light district is an important tourist attraction in Amsterdam, and it is well maintained, regulated, and patrolled. We would see men and women and even children touring this district.

Along the main street and its network of alleyways and side streets, scantily clad women sit behind picture windows or stand in doorways to small rooms just large enough for a single bed. Red fluorescent lights above the window give a pink glow to the room. In addition to the rooms along the canal, some of the long alleys are furnished with dozens of such rooms on both sides. Here, the narrowest street in Amsterdam, about a meter wide at one point has rooms on both sides. We found ourselves trapped in the middle going against the main stream of traffic and had to reverse out.

Some of the windows have drapes drawn, a sign of service in process. Some are just completing a deal and some are in negotiation. There are all types of women, many very beautiful, many young, some old, every color, some fat and some skinny. There is something for everyone.

I could tell that this site was quite a shock and an uncomfortable experience for Pauline, even though the majority of the people here were simply tourists gawking at this bizarre site. There were, indeed, also a sizable number of real customers here to shop and bargain. After a good look we left the red light district and passed once again through the fringe area, where sex shops and "coffee shops" cater to those who couldn’t handle the real thing by offering gadgets, movies, simulators, and marijuana..

This visit sparked an interesting discussion about life in general that lasted for some time. Although there are reports suggesting that some of the ladies wind up here through trickery and deception, there is sufficient evidence that the majority are professionals who consider this a business and choose it because the job is more interesting than waitressing in a restaurant and the pay is much better.

Marijuana is legal in The Netherlands, though very carefully regulated. The place to purchase and smoke pot is in one of the many coffee shops. These range from simple hole in the wall shops with cut rate prices to the upscale, luxurious shops that sell the very best and cater to the wealthy. The system works extremely well. I don’t understand why other countries have not learned from the successful control of marijuana in The Netherlands. In America, someone is arrested for a marijuana related "crime" every 38 seconds. How could intelligent people continue such an obscene waste of resources?

I love cities where the street entertainment is good; Amsterdam is such a place. After an Argentine steak dinner we decided to make an early night of it and headed for the hotel. Just outside our hotel, two entrepreneurs had set up a show station. One provided a didgeridoo background while the other added sounds with his mouth. These guys were good. I watched for several sets and made a donation. The singer fitted a nice "Thank You" right into the song.

Musicians entertaining on the street in Amsterdam

The next day, Tuesday, we rose at six, walked to the station, hopped on the train and headed for to Leeuwarden, capitol of the province of Friesland, a beautiful city of 100,000, where friends Bauke and Kathleen Heeg live. The trip took 2 hours and fifteen minutes on the impressive Dutch rail system. This system runs so much like clockwork that we had a scheduled two minute train change about half way. Fortunately Bauke had alerted us to this so we jumped off our train just as the connecting train rolled in on the next track. By the time we were seated that train was off.

As agreed, Bauke met us at the station and we walked through the town center along canals to his home near the city center along a scenic route including historic buildings and structures. The city goes back about 800 years and some of the buildings are almost that old. As we were walking up to his home, Kathleen approached from the other direction on a bike with Anaka on the back, returning from a birthday party for one of Anaka's friends. Anaka speaks fluent English, Dutch, and some French, and Kathleen is learning Dutch.

To get permission to live in The Netherlands a person must agree to learn to speak Dutch. I think this is a great rule, even if it is not strongly enforced. Like many small European countries, The Netherlands has a very unique culture. I would hate very much for this culture to be transformed into something else by immigrants who come here because the country is a great place to live and then refuse to accept the culture that made it so great. By insisting on maintaining and promoting their own much different culture (that could never have produced such a great place to live) they seem determined to destroy the very things that brought them here. Unfortunately, those who attempt to preserve the culture of a country like The Netherlands are too often labled racists.

So many people ride bikes that there is very little auto traffic in the town. After a typical Dutch lunch, we walked around other interesting parts of town and checked out a few old churches and buildings. When we returned, Pauline, Kathleen and Anaka went off and enjoyed each other, while Bauke and I spent the rest of the afternoon discussing his projects and work.

Bauke drove us about half way back to Amsterdam along one of the major Dikes that enabled the Dutch to reclaim a huge amount of land, showing us a few small villages, including the one where he grew up. We stood on the dike, viewing a large fresh water lake on one side and the ocean on the other.

Bauke dropped us at a nearby train stations and we were on our way back to Amsterdam within minutes. We were so exhausted by this time, we skipped dinner and collapsed in bed.

Anne Franks House is an example of a tourist attraction that has not been on the Worlds Worst Tourist must see list. In many trips to Amsterdam, I placed other sites and museums ahead of it. On our first pass by the site we encountered a long line extending several blocks. With only two days to spend in Amsterdam, our first thought was not to spend hours waiting in a line.

However, in keeping with my open minded approach to touring and also to satisfy Pauline’s desire to make the visit, we elected to return on Wednesday before the museum opened to inspect the lines and make a final decision. That proved successful. By arriving a few minutes before opening, we were in the museum shortly after its nine AM opening time. By the time we emerged an hour later, the line to get in was over an hour long.

The Diary of Anne Frank is one of the best known publications in existence. Of the eight people who were hidden for two years in a small, concealed apartment along an Amsterdam canal, only one, Anne Frank’s father, Otto, survived the holocaust. The rest were either gassed or died of disease and exhaustion. Anne and her sister died of cholera within days before the concentration camps were liberated.

One can get as much from such a visit as one has imagination. Like minimal art, the viewer must bring a lot to the viewing. There is no furniture, presumably at Otto Frank’s insistence since the original furniture was confiscated by the Nazi’s, and no photography allowed. The structure has been greatly modified to handle tourists, including toilets and a large gift shop. This conveniently enables more tourists to move faster through the house.

To stand in the very rooms where she spent her days in fear of the Nazi’s, to read her quotes and story on the walls, and to see original hand written works of this young lady provided the context for a very emotional experience. Many people leave here in tears. People who believe the holocaust never happened should visit such places.

Much of the beauty of The Netherlands comes in the form of flowers. We walked from Anne Frank’s house to the flower market, a 15 minute walk. Pauline shopped for bulbs and I found a painting spot near the canal. The flower market sells anything related to plants and flowers, including marijuana seeds and starter kits.

The Flower Market on the first, or Singel, canal, about a 20 minute walk from the central station.

Bulbs in the Flower Market

While at the flower market, we enjoyed a typical Dutch lunch. Pauline chose the pea soup and I had a dish called uitsmatter, a combination of eggs, ham and cheese.

Typical Dutch lunch (Actually, what is known as a second breakfast). I had uitsmater, which comprises toast, ham, and eggs and Pauline had pea soup.

Choosing what to see and what to leave out with time restrictions is a difficult choice in a city like Amsterdam. This was my first trip to Amsterdam in which I had not worked in a visit to the famous Rijksmuseum or Van Gogh museum. One can easily spend a few days here just enjoying the art of Rembrandt, Vermeer, Van Gogh, and other Dutch masters. We spent the rest of the day strolling around and checking out a few other sites before heading back to the airport for our return flight, which had us back in England before dark.