For our first day in The Netherlands we had reserved tickets to see Anne Frank’s “house” in Amsterdam. Not really wanting to drive into Amsterdam itself, we made plans with Aunt Janny to drive to a stadium for parking just inside the ring road and then take the tram into the city.
We saw lots of windmills as we drove, just not the traditional variety!
All went well, we had a very good navigation system that came with our car. And we had the added benefit of a real GPS (Genuine Person Speaking) in the form of Aunt Janny! We had the address so we put it into the machine and off we went! Once we had left the ring road we drove for about 10 minutes until Aunt Janny said she didn’t think it was right; we should have been there by now. So we pulled over and worked out that the GPS was taking us right into the middle of Amsterdam. Uh oh! No wonder there was a lot of traffic!
We then put the address in again, using the postcode instead of the city, and this time it had the right place. So we turned around when we could and headed back in the direction we had come. What made things even more difficult was that you not only had to watch out for cars and pedestrians, but also trams and bicycles! You often have to give way to the many bikes.
I had only just said, “At least we don’t have closed roads to contend with this time!” when you can guess what happened! Yep, a closed road. The detour took us down this little lane, but this truck stopped, and the two guys got out! They were picking up illegal garbage from the side of the road, apparently oblivious to the fact that they were holding up all the detour traffic.
Not quite what we were expecting!!! We did see what we were expecting too though, lots of very pretty canals and lots of bicycles:
We soon got to where we had intended to go, and caught the tram into the city. Yes, we were finally in central Amsterdam, and not in a car either!
Here’s Mike with Aunt Janny, trying to fill some rather large shoes!
He needed new shoes, but y’know, this was not what I had in mind. 😉
It was time for lunch, and all the usual options were here:
But we opted to eat something Dutch.
No, it’s not pizza. It is a savoury Dutch pancake, with cheese and bacon on top! Very nice!
Then we walked towards the Anne Frank House, seeing many of these typical row houses on the way.
There are many Indonesian restaurants here, including this very nice looking warung:
I never saw a warung in Indonesia that looked that nice!
We arrived at the street where Anne (pronounced Anna!) Frank’s father’s business/factory was, down on the left of this street:
It was the building in the middle, with the flag pole.
And this was the view opposite the Anne Frank House:
It was a very interesting place to visit (no photos allowed inside though). Aunt Janny had never been to it and thought it was interesting also. They have all of Anne Frank’s diaries and notebooks on display, as well as many photos. We all thought it was very well done. Everything moved well inside the building, the number of people was just right. We had booked tickets weeks ago and just showed up at our allotted time and went in. You really do have to book ahead though, unless you like standing in the cold for a long time. 😉 They sell  tickets at the door daily after 3.30, but you can expect to stand in this line that went down the road and around the corner.
Then we headed back into town. These houses looked like they were on a definite lean:
We found a nice cafe to sit in and have a drink:
And enjoyed the view looking down to the back of the royal palace, watching boats, cars and people go by.
The biggest change that I noticed in buildings is that here there is so much brick work:
I managed to snap this shot from the tram of a girl riding her bike while using her  phone. We saw quite a few people doing this, some with the phone right up in front of their faces! The two guys on the steps are using their phones too, but at least they’re stationary. 😉
We went back to Emmeloord amongst quite a bit of traffic on the roads!
We picked up Zeba (who is staying with Aunt Janny) and finished the day with some good Indonesian food at a restaurant in Emmeloord:
We’ve been having fun with languages as Aunt Janny speaks quite a few. Zeba is from Tajikistan and speaks no English and is learning Dutch, but Aunt Janny speaks to her in Russian. So Aunt Janny would translate between us, and occasionally would translate what Zeba had said into Dutch for us by mistake until she noticed our blank stares and realised she had to translate into English, not Dutch! Her poor brain!!! And she and I used Indonesian with the waiters in the restaurant, just to be really multi-lingual. 🙂
Thanks for taking the time to write explaining the pictures. They are so good. It’s like we are tagging along with you!
Surely those clogs weren’t on the side walk. People could trip over them. ” I AM” stood out, I suppose it means “No 1 Amsterdam”.
Janny looks well.
Yep, the clogs were on the sidewalk, but they weren’t clogging it up 😉 they were in a place where the sidewalk was very wide. We’re pretty sure that a heart was missing in the I_Amsterdam sign!