Amsterdam Travel Guide: How We Spent 4 Days in Amsterdam
Last, but certainly not least in the European honeymoon recap blogs – Amsterdam! When we planned our honeymoon, since we went to London for family obligations, we each decided we’d pick one city to spend a few days in. Unsurprisingly, my pick was Paris, and my husband went back and forth on whether he wanted to do Amsterdam, or Brussels. Ultimately, he landed on Amsterdam and I’m so glad we ended up going there! The city is so lively, and filled with the most beautiful old buildings. I could absolutely see us living there at some point in time. But, before I get ahead of myself, let’s recap our four days in the city of Amsterdam!
Day 1: Exploring the Canals
When we arrived in Amsterdam, we were both starting to get pretty exhausted. We had been doing nothing but go-go-go-ing for a week straight at this point, and averaging well over 20,000 steps a day, which try as I might, I definitely don’t do at home. It was safe to say, we were starting to crash and feel very tired at this point. Since we didn’t get into Amsterdam until almost 4pm, and we were staying just outside the city in Zaandam, we decided to just have a short, and sweet little trip into the city centre, and walk around. We explored, took photos, and then headed back to our hotel for the evening where I quickly fell asleep around 7:30 pm. Thankfully, we could get a good night’s rest because we didn’t have to be up early the next morning for the first time in the last week!
Day 2: Sleeping In and the Anne Frank House
Luckily, on our second day there, I had booked our tickets for Anne Frank House in the afternoon, so we had an opportunity to sleep in a bit this morning, and we desperately needed it. Once we got up, we got ready, grabbed a quick breakfast, and made our way to Amsterdam Centraal to explore and do some quick souvenir shopping before our 1:30 pm tickets at the Anne Frank House. While we looked around, we came across the Homomonument, a memorial for all of the LGBTQ+ people who were persecuted for their sexual orientation. If you watch Ted Lasso (spoiler alert), you may recognize this as the area where Trent and Colin have a heart-to-heart.
Once we wrapped up some shopping & exploring, we made our way over to the Anne Frank House and waited for our turn to enter. Once inside, you are unfortunately not allowed to take any photos or videos, which I completely understand, however, I wish I could’ve shared the harrowing things that were inside of that Annex with the world. I truly believe that everyone needs to experience this at some point in their lives, and if you are headed to Amsterdam, you must book tickets (note: you need to book them online about 4 weeks in advance or you will not get in). And for those of you wondering, yes, this was the house that the Franks, Van Pels and Fritz Pfeffer hid in for two years, and yes, it’s upsetting, but a very strong & stark reminder that we cannot allow this to ever happen again.
When we wrapped up at the Anne Frank House, feeling more than a little emotional, we continued on with our day of souvenir shopping and exploring. We kept it relatively relaxed and easy for the rest of the day given that we experienced a very emotionally charged tour, and we were starting to feel the exhaustion of our trip catching up on us.
Day 3: Van Gogh & the Rijksmuseum
Unlike our second day, on our third day, we had to be up early for our 10 am tickets for the Van Gogh Museum, which I can confidently say was my absolute favourite museum we went to in Amsterdam, though that may be mildly biased as Van Gogh is one of my all-time favourite artists, and Sunflowers & Almond Blossom stole my heart, both of which were on display in this museum. Though be prepared to line up at Sunflowers – lots of people crowded around this painting to get a photo, more so than Almond Blossom, and you will need to be pretty pushy to get to the front and get a photo for yourself. I’d reckon to say that if Starry Night was on display there, you’d probably also see this kind of chaos, however, it unfortunately is not housed at the Van Gogh Museum, but in the MoMA in NYC.
Once we wrapped up at the Van Gogh Museum, we moved on to the largest museum I think I’ve ever been to that is right across from Van Gogh, the Rijksmuseum. Though Van Gogh was my favourite, this museum was mind-blowing and housed some of the oldest pieces of art, sculptures and findings I’ve ever seen, dating back as far as 1100! Plus, it’s also the museum that holds the famous Rembrandt painting, The Night Watch which was painted back in 1642. While we were there, they happened to be doing a digital scan of it as the painting has started to crack from the vibrations made by people talking and air conditioning. It’s also absolutely massive, measuring in at 12 x 14.5 ft, and was extremely impressive to see in person.
Day 4: A Slow Day, Canal Cruise & Chaos
Suddenly, before our eyes, our last day not only in Amsterdam but of our European vacation had arrived. We both were exhausted, and quite honestly, very sad to be on our last full day here, but we decided to make the most of it and have a lovely, relaxing day. We slept in a bit again, packed some of our stuff, and headed out to the east of Amsterdam where we decided to grab some snacks and lunch from the Albert Heijn grocery store and sit in Oosterpark. The park was stunning, but if you don’t already know, I’m terrified of birds, and wow there were a lot of them – just something to note if you are also scared of birds. They didn’t end up bothering us, and when we finished our lunch, we decided to walk around the entire park and make our way back to the centre of the city for more exploring – this is where things started to go wrong that day.
Unfortunately, while we were waiting for the intercity train back to Amsterdam Centraal, we found out there was a system failure that prohibited any trains in or out of Amsterdam Centraal. I thought there was no way it would last that long, but the long and short of it? It did. It lasted all night and into the next morning; but we’ll get into that in more detail in the next paragraph.
Since the trains were down, we decided to make the 45 minute walk to Amsterdam Centraal, and once we got there, we grabbed a quick coffee and sat down to wait for our 9:30 pm sunset canal boat tour that we booked with Flagship Amsterdam. Though it is really is very tacky-tourist, it was seriously one of the best parts about our time in Amsterdam for me. They served a selection of Dutch cheese and wine, and we got to tour down the canal for an hour while our guide told us all about the history of Amsterdam, and let us ask questions. Her name was Eva, and she was awesome. I highly recommend booking with them and if you happen to be on board with Eva, you’re guaranteed to have a great time.
Once we wrapped up at 10:30 pm, the trains unfortunately still were not running, Amsterdam Centraal was in absolute chaos, not only from people stranded in the city centre who needed to get home to the suburbs, but there happened to also be a Harry Styles concert that night. Busses were packed, and you could not get on there even if you tried, so we were left to try and book an overpriced Uber (which kept getting declined) or take an overpriced taxi back to Zaandam as we had a 12:15 pm flight and since Schipol is a huge, very busy airport, we needed to be there for 8 am. We finally found a taxi, paid the offensive price of 56€, got home at 1:30 am, and scheduled an Uber for the next morning, which also was offensively priced at just under 60€. And no, the trains were still not back up by this point, so I’m grateful we pre-scheduled the Uber.
Though the last night our time in Amsterdam was a bit chaotic to say the least, we still had the most incredible time there and loved our hotel, Inntel Hotels Amsterdam Zaandam, and couldn’t recommend it more. If you’re worried about the trains going down, don’t be! It almost never happens, it was just bad luck for us, and their public transit into the city is so easy to use, you won’t regret saving money by staying outside of the city.
Though this is the last recap blog, I promise you this isn’t the last of the European travel blogs coming (they’ll probably just be a bit more spaced out from now on 😉); if you have any requests, drop them in the comments below, otherwise, keep an eye out for a dedicated Disneyland Paris blog coming soon, and sign up for the newsletter if you don’t want to miss a thing!
