Sunday, April 22
With sunny, warm weather in the forecast, I took the kids to the beach at Zandvoort! We got up and rolling in the morning and made it to the beach by 10 am. There weren’t many people on the beach quite this early, so the kids had plenty of room to run around. Their mission was to find sea shells at the beach — and they found a bunch! We spent about 3.5 hours on the beach while the kids played in the sand, rinsed off in the cold water, and hunted for shells.
After the beach we ate pizza at La Fontanella Pizzeria and then caught the train back to Amsterdam.
Instead of the beach, Keller went to see a showing of Lawrence of Arabia in 70mm at the EYE Film Museum. He’d never seen the movie before and thought it was a neat opportunity to see an iconic film on 70 mm film.
The kids did some quiet time at the apartment and then spent the rest of the afternoon and evening playing with other kids in our area. It’s amazing how they can work out games despite language barriers — this time many of the kids spoke Spanish in addition to Dutch. Keller and I visited with some of the parents who were having a cookout in the beautiful weather.
Monday
Today was a day trip to Efteling! Efteling is a theme park that pre-dates DisneyLand. It has some of the same ideas, but it is based on the more traditional (and darker) fairy tales of Hans Christian Anderson and the Brothers Grimm. They have a nice combination of roller coasters, dark rides, and fantasy decorations.
In fact, our favorite thing about Efteling was the themeing! The queue lines were particularly impressive! The entrance for the Flying Dutchman started as a wealthy merchant’s home, walked through a torn painting into an underground passage, up into store rooms and a bar before descending into a canal between 1600-era city streets. It was fantastic!
Caden’s favorite ride was the Vogel Rok, an indoor dark roller coaster. Keller and Kamy both liked Symbolica — the newest, trackless dark ride. My favorite was the themeing surrounding the Flying Dutchman boat roller coaster.
The park itself was busier than we were expecting, as we often had to wait 30+ minutes to get on a ride. We were able to ride most of what we were hoping to and left when the park closed at 6pm.
We had only eaten a light lunch at Efteling, so we grabbed dinner at NONNA! in ‘S Hertogensbosch. It was Roman style Italian and it was phenomenal. It had a very different flavor profile than we typically experience as “Italian” food in the US. They also make all their fettuccine fresh daily in house, so we ordered the carbonara and arribiata, plus the margarita pizza.
It was after 10pm by the time we made it back home to Amsterdam, so we were all tired from a long day. My FitBit said we walked 22,000 steps today!
Tuesday
We slept this morning– we all needed to recover a bit from Efteling. Once we were up and had eaten breakfast, we walked to the Tropen Museum. There was a neat exhibit on Body Art and the kids were fascinated by some of the more unusual body modifications that were pictured in the exhibit.
For lunch we ate at Jasmine Thai. Caden has been a big fan of pad thai lately and Kamy really liked the red curry and rice. Dessert was little chocolate bonbons from ganache, tucked inside the Oude Kerk.
After lunch, Keller went back to the apartment and I took the kids to TunFun. It was a cold, kind of wet, typical early spring day in Amsterdam, so an indoor activity was just the thing. TunFun had a massive drop slide too — I’ve never seen a slide so steep! One thing is for sure, you can definitely hurt yourself on a Dutch playground! Of course, once they worked up the nerve to try the slide, it was their favorite thing there! In the second photo you can see Caden sitting at the top of the slide … those are his legs dangling down!
Wednesday
Kamy expressed an interest in going to the Rembrandt Huis — the building where Rembrandt lived and worked for most of his professional life. Since he was a successful artist during his lifetime, he had many apprentices who studied under him and assisted him in his work. The museum was incredibly lucky — when Rembrandt ultimately lost the house due to failure to pay on his “mortgage,” a detailed inventory was drawn up of every single item, in every single room. Many of these items are in the museum today and what is not has been carefully curated to show what it would have looked like during his time.
There was even a demonstration showing how oil paint was created — by combining oil (linseed in the demo) with powders to create the paint. It was an art in itself. Only enough paint was made to use that one day, one drop too little oil and the paint would be chalky; one drop too much oil and it wouldn’t dry smooth and would leave ripples. It was fascinating.
We had lunch at Betty Blue and were all very pleased with our meal.
From there, we walked to the Museum Willet-Holthuysen. It is essentially a time capsule to see the standard of living of the very wealthy in the 1800s. The home and furniture and art were donated to the City of Amsterdam upon Louisa’s death, on condition that it would be turned into a museum. It has been meticulously preserved and really showed the opulence that was possible at the time. Kamy and Caden were both fascinated by it.
Before heading home, the kids and I went by the Rembrandt statues in Rembrandtplein. The life size statues of figures from The Night Watch were pretty impressive!
Keller then went to a local barber, MOKUM Barbers, for a haircut and shave. It wasn’t quite what he was expecting, but Ian did a great job. It was a little more Hip Hop than Keller typically chooses. In Keller’s words, “It was an adventure.” =)
We’d arranged for my cousin, Linda, to come spend the afternoon with the kids for a few hours. Keller and I went out to eat at a Rijs Tafel restaurant, Puri Mas — a traditional Indonesian restaurant where they serve a myriad of dishes over several courses. It was different and pretty tasty! And we discovered that we just do not care for jack fruit. =P
The kids had a great time with Linda. They played Sushi Go, hide and seek at the playground, and ate pizza for dinner. By the time we returned the kids were doing their screen time before bed. We appreciated Linda staying with the kids so we could have a date night while in Amsterdam!
Thursday
Thursday started out a little rocky — the kids both acted like they needed a down-day, so we spent the morning at home. We ventured out for tapas at La Oliva. On the way we stopped and bought a piece of fresh herring. It’s not quite raw, but lightly pickled, and served with onions and pickles. While it isn’t our new favorite dish, we all tried it and found it tasted okay — not fishy at all. The tapas were tasty too! We ordered seven different items and then each ordered a second of our favorites.
We had dessert at Cup A La Cake, where Kamy chose a cake pop and Caden had a cupcake decorated for Koningsdag. Keller and I sampled several of their mini cupcakes.
Keller then headed back to the apartment for work, while the kids and I went to the Public Library. There is a large, handmade “mouse house” on display that was essentially a massive look and find treasure hunt. The kids spent 30 minutes searching for specific parts of the house (to match photos in a book) and then playing I Spy.
The evening was spent at home — with the kids playing outside with friends. We’ve been very pleased with our apartment because it gives the kids a lot of autonomy and freedom.
Friday
Koningsdag! Koningsdag is a national Dutch holiday. We tried to go back to Bakers and Roasters for breakfast, but they were closed, so we ended up at Prins Heerlijk where the kids split a nutella and banana pancake and Keller and I ordered eggs on toast.
We then tried to go to the Dutch Resistance Museum, but it was also closed today. Instead we went across the street and returned to Micropia. We had plenty of time to see the full museum now and it was really quite interesting! There were microscopes, beakers, and lots of different videos explaining how the bacteria or virus or fungi were different.
We came back home for lunch before the kids headed outside to set up their booth for Koningsdag. They were attempting to sell sea shells that they collected on Sunday. They had a few customers (including Daddy), but they ultimately spent the majority of their time playing. There was a bounce house, pony rides, and music. There were a lot of kids running around too, so there was plenty to see and do. Kamy and Caden spent all afternoon outside, came in for dinner, and then went back out until bedtime. It was a full day, despite spending more than half of it at home. =)
Saturday
We had one last day in Amsterdam! Today was our last chance to revisit some favorites and hit a few last stops on our list. We started with breakfast at Bakers and Roasters. Everyone enjoyed the eggs benedict last time, so we choose 3 orders of eggs benny and one huevos rancheros. It was just as tasty as the previous trip!
Next we went to Museum Van Loon in the Canal District. It is an old canal side house that has been owned by the Van Loon family since the 1800s. It was very opulent, especially for the time, and descendants of the Van Loon family still live in the house (though the attic floor now). The gardens and coach house were particular favorites.
I really wanted to visit the Dutch Resistance Museum, so we went there next. There is a neat kids program where you follow the story of four different children and how their lives were affected by WWII (a Jewish girl, a girl from a Nazi sympathizer family, a boy whose father openly preached resistance from the pulpit, and a boy whose family was just trying to stay out of the way). It was fascinating, especially the girl who supported the Nazi presence. We didn’t even touch the main part of the museum, but we still spent almost 2 hours there.
For lunch we returned to BurgerMeester because it was just down the street, we were hungry, and we knew it would be good. We waited for a table, but ultimately were sat with a woman eating alone. We ended up having a very pleasant conversation with her while enjoying our meal.
Next up, we went back toward the Canals and had dessert at Metropolitan. They made the best poffertjes Keller had all trip, so it was worth the return trip. The kids also ordered the same poffertjes with nutella and white chocolate. Yummm!
Keller wanted to check out the Hermitage Amsterdam, and Kamy opted to join him. The Hermitage Amsterdam is a relatively new art museum — a satellite branch of the famous Hermitage in Saint Petersburg Russia. Caden and I went back to the apartment and he did some screen time while I worked on packing to leave in the morning.
Caden ate pizza at the apartment, while Keller and Kamy went to the De Carrousel, a pancake restaurant with a carousel in the middle of everything.
We enjoyed our time in Amsterdam! There was so much to see and do, especially museums. Some had wonderful audio guides or kids programs too, so they were very memorable. The kids and Daddy liked the Royal Palace, while I really enjoyed Micropia.
I am confident that we will be returning to Amsterdam again in the future — how many years out is hard to say. But it’s a neat city! We were very happy with our AirBNB … the location was fabulous, the kids could play outside, and there was plenty of room for us indoors too.
Tot Ziens Amsterdam!
