DAY 1 – May 18, 2017

Our ship arrives in Amsterdam overnight.  We awake, finish packing our luggage and set it in the hall for the porters by 8:30 am.  Many of our fellow passengers have disembarked much earlier and departed for the airport.  We say goodbye to our cruise director, Stefan.

We will be staying in Amsterdam for two nights so we do not need to rush.  Off to breakfast, our final meal aboard the Viking Aegir.

There we see several of our new friends that are also staying in the city.  We hop in a taxi at 10:00 am and soon we are at the JL 76 Hotel.  Our room will not be ready until 3:00 so we leave our bags at the desk and begin to explore.

Rosie had picked the hotel location in the heart of the museum district.  We passed through there first to get our bearings.

The city spaces are shared by pedestrians and vehicles, but, owned by the bicycles.

Walking closer to the center of the city, we pass many canals…

… while some are just doing business as usual …

… we stopped for lunch.

We continued toward the National Monument, Royal Palace and Gassen Dam Square.

Then we saw the outside of the Anne Frank House.

Walking back to the hotel…

… we found a quiet spot to sit.

At the hotel, our room was ready, so, we quickly settled in and asked the front desk for dinner recommendations.  Close by we found “The Seafood Bar”.  We were glad to have stayed even after the longer than expected wait.

Seafood grill platter for two with a whole lobster, clams, cockles, mussels,  salmon, white fish, squid, giant prawns and octopus… yummy! A very nice bottle to go with makes two very happy travelers.

DAY 2 – May 19, 2017

For our second day in Amsterdam we had a guided tour which included the Rijks Museum, a “Dutch” lunch, a canal boat tour and the Van Gogh Museum.

The Rijks allows photos and the Van Gogh does not.  Our photos do not do these painting justice, so, click on the links to see the collections.

CLICK HERE to see the Rijk Museum collection

CLICK HERE to see the Van Gogh Museum collection

Our tour guide was a very entertaining and knowledgeable art historian.

We gained more of an appreciation for the works of Rembrandt, Van Gogh and some of their contemporaries.

The canal tour was a welcome break between the two museums seeing much more than we ever could afoot.

By the end of the all-day tour, we were tired and had an al fresco dinner and stopped for pancakes (crepes) for dessert.

We accumulated 30K steps during our two day stay in Amsterdam and needed to prepare for the journey home that would start in the very early morning.

P.S.  We guess that at least one of the Guardians is from The Neatherlands… 

… and he recycles.