Sunday — April 15th
Sunday we slept in! We took our time getting up and going, ate lunch at home, and then ventured out. We started with a pop up market next to the Rijksmuseum. Kamy found a couple of souvenirs to bring home — a ring was her biggest purchase. Caden found a few little trinkets as well. So far their money is holding out, but we’re doing a lot of reminding that their money has to last and they only get 10 euros per week from us for the remainder of the trip. Both kids are struggling with impulse control, but that’s a learned skill they’ll get a lot of practice with this trip!
At the market we also got some poffertjes (Keller’s favorite Dutch food) and some stroopwaffels. Fresh stroopwaffels are much better than the ones you get in the grocery store!
We were right next to the Van Gogh museum, so we decided to visit while we were in the area. Thanks to our MuseumKaart, we were able to walk up and get admission tickets without booking a time slot in advance. The museum was very busy, but since it was the weekend, I wasn’t too surprised. The kids had a worksheet to fill out and their prize was a free post card and a sticker when they completed it. The audio guide was decent too. Caden’s favorite Van Gogh painting was The Potato Eaters, while Kamy liked his blue Irises. I like the idea of the kids’ programs and worksheets, because they pay more attention to the paintings and think about them more. But it definitely means the kids need more interaction and it’s harder for the adults to just listen to the audio guide and enjoy the paintings on our own. Oh well — there’ll come a time when everyone is independent, so we’re making do the best we can. =)
After the museum we split up — Keller and Caden went to dinner at a Turkish restaurant, while Kamy and I had tickets to see the ballet. Unfortunately I misunderstood which building we needed to be at, but we made the show just in time by high tailing it across town. The ballet was put on by the Junior Company, part of the Dutch National Ballet. The performance was in a spectacular building called the Stadsschouwberg Amsterdam. We had decent seats and were able to move closer to the stage after the first part of the performance. The show was in three parts — a traditional ballet and then two separate modern ballet / dance routines. Kamy and I both preferred the traditional ballet overall, but the modern were interesting too!
Caden really liked the Turkish food they had for dinner and his favorite was the lamb. He particularly liked dipping the food in all the different sauces.
Monday
Monday was a partial day — both to recover from a busy weekend and in preparation for a busy upcoming week! We attempted to go to the Tropenmuseum, but unfortunately found it closed. Google listed it as open on Mondays but it was very wrong. Instead we went to the ARTIS Zoo. It was a nice little zoo, but nothing like the Bronx Zoo. The kids seemed to enjoy it though, and we spent about two and a half hours there before everyone was too hungry to ignore. =)
Keller led us to a local market in Dappurbuurt where we had doner wraps and doner broodjes for lunch. The kids thought the food was okay, but Keller particularly enjoyed it. We wandered through the market before walking back to the apartment. Some much needed quiet time, screen time, and then about 45 minutes at the local park finished out the rest of the day.
Tuesday
We were out and about first thing this morning to go to the Keukenhof! The Keukenhof is the world famous flower garden and show that runs for 8 weeks each spring. The gardens span almost 90 acres with hundreds of varieties of flowers and millions of blooms. There’s some variation in what is blooming at a given time, due to the eight week run, but there were many many blooms while we were there. The daffodils were fading, the hyacinths were in full bloom, and many varieties of tulips were at their peak. We arrived early enough that the crowds were not too numerous and the lighting was great for photos. The weather was a little cool first thing, but it warmed up as the day went by.
The kids loved looking at all the tulip varieties in the green house and Caden took as many photos as he could with his camera (and limited battery life). They also enjoyed playing on a typical Dutch playground — non-sanitized, perfectly-capable-of-hurting-yourself, and lots of fun!
For lunch we waited until we’d returned to Amsterdam to go to Piccolo Mondo — the same Italian restaurant Keller and Kamy went to last week. Our meal was tasty and the kids were impressed by the pizza hawai they’d chosen.
We grabbed ice cream from IJscuypje — Caden chose white chocolate, Kamy had lemon, Keller had chocolate chip cookie ice cream, and I chose chocolate.
After dessert we went back to the apartment for a bit. The kids did quiet time and Keller started work. After quiet time, the kids and I walked to the park for about an hour. Another quick grocery store run for more bread, then back home for dinner. After dinner the kids went outside and found some local kids to play with.
By the end of the day the weather was fabulous, so we’ve had the door open and the kids were in and out playing for a good hour. We’ve been so happy with this location — it’s close to public transportation, very safe, three grocery stores within 10 minutes, and allows the kids to have some space to run and play with other kids.
Wednesday
Today we went to the Anne Frank house. The museum is currently under renovation, but we were still able to walk through the warehouse on the first few floors, plus see the secret annex where the Frank family and 4 others hid. Honestly, we were underwhelmed. The rooms were all empty, and while there was an audio tour, it didn’t really add much to the information available on plaques on the wall. The kids had a few questions about the house and the family, but we’d talked about the overarching history, so it wasn’t completely foreign information.
Caden expressed an interest in taking a canal boat tour a few days ago, so we bought tickets for the Lovers Canal Cruise via Groupon and spent an hour seeing the city from the water. The tour itself wasn’t particularly informational, but it was interesting to see some of the canals and house boats close up.
We ate lunch at Cannibal Royale — tasty burgers, ribs, chicken wings, and garlic bread. We went back to the apartment for quiet time and then the kids spent about two hours playing at the local playground. We all turned in early because tomorrow we’re heading to the Walibi amusement park and have a full day ahead of us!
Thursday
Walibi Holland theme park was on the agenda for today! Kamy was very disappointed that she was unable to go two weeks ago (when Keller and Caden went by themselves), so we wanted to make a point of going back out as a family if we could. Keller took the day off from work, we had beautiful warm weather, and we had a great time!
Getting there was a process, particularly since the bus for the last leg of the trip was in high demand. Since the buses only run every 30 minutes, if you miss a bus you have a lengthy wait. There were too many people waiting, and no queue line, so it was a mad rush to board the bus. We missed the first AND second bus and were finally able to get on the third bus. Fortunately the park itself was not very busy and we were still able to ride everything we wanted to with minimal lines.
Keller’s favorite roller coaster was still Goliath. Kamy and Caden could ride most of the roller coasters, including several large ones. Both kids liked the wooden coaster Robin Hood — even enough to go do it again, by themselves, in the first car. =)
However, the new favorite coaster for the kids was Xpress! It’s a launch coaster where you start in a creepy tunnel, then are launched forward into the light and go through many twists, turns, and loops at high speed. Both kids rode it a total of three times, including (once more) by themselves in the front!
We also did the ferris wheel, log flume, Merlin’s Castle, and many of the smaller kids rides. We had a much easier time heading home, stopped at the grocery store for dinner ingredients, and then recovered from the day. We all had fun, but it was a full day by the time you added in all the travel time and the sunny, warm weather.
Friday
Today was a lighter day. We are trying really hard not to burn out by going too hard for too long. We all slept in and ate breakfast at home before heading to the EYE Film Museum. On the way we got to take the ferry across the water. The kids also climbed on the I AMsterdam sign on the water front. It’s identical to the one by the Rijksmuseum, except much less busy!
There were some small exhibits about the history and innovations of film through the years, and the kids enjoyed the green screen activity and film quiz. Keller is going to try to catch a movie at the museum in a few days if we can make the timing work out.
After the museum we walked along the water to lunch at Henneke’s Boom — a sandwich bar right on the water. The sandwiches were pretty tasty and all had very different flavors. We then went to a bakery where we bought an appletaart and applebrood for dessert. On the way home we did the obligatory grocery store stop and also bought some ice cream to eat with the appletart.
After quiet time, the kids put on their swimsuits and we went to the local park again. That way they didn’t have to worry about staying clean or dry in the sand and water. We spent about 90 minutes there before it was time to come back for a bath and dinner. Kamy and Caden have been requesting margarita pizzas for dinner, so that’s been easy to pick up at the store and bake in the oven.
Saturday
First thing Saturday morning we went to the NEMO science museum. It was Keller’s first time there and he was very impressed! I think it’s the best hands-on science museum I’ve been to. It was pretty deserted when we arrived, so the kids had plenty of time to play with the exhibits before it got crowded. We also watched the Rube Goldberg machine and Caden was chosen to be the trigger and set everything off!
After NEMO, we went to lunch at BurgerMeester. These were the best burgers we’ve had so far in Amsterdam!
We dropped into the Micropia museum across the street to check it out. Our museum card gets us in for free, so it was easy to justify the quick stop. It’s essentially a zoo of micro organisms, with microscopes and vials of many different creatures. There’s also a sheet that you get to stamp as you work your way through the museum, so of course that was a hit for Kamy and Caden.
Keller found a free jazz concert at the Bimhuis, so we worked our way back north to check it out. The concert started 30 minutes later than we were expecting, but it was really quite good! There were 9 members of the jazz band — piano, bass, drums, two trumpets, one trombone, and three saxophones. Our favorite piece was one they’d composed called 608. For a free concert, we were very impressed! Even the kids enjoyed it and Caden especially liked watching the drummer.
Next we took the tram to the Albert Cuyp market to wander through the stalls and food carts. We snagged some poffertjes (twice), chicken drumsticks, and a nutella and strawberry crepe as snacks. Kamy and Caden each picked out a generic Amsterdam post card and a wooden tulip magnet to add to their collection of souvenirs.
The evening was spent back at home — letting the kids run around outside with some new friends and resting our weary legs.