Amsterdam in Two Days: My Top 10 Things to Do

I opted to purchase the I amsterdam City Card, which offers free entry to a number of museums and attractions, free food samples, discounts at restaurants and other sites, free public transportation, and one boat ride on the canal. We opted for the 48-hour card, but they offer 24- and 72-hour cards. I found this card to be helpful for discovering things you hadn’t considered visiting, as well.

Though the Anne Frank House (which I mentioned in number two and will stop talking about it by bullet eight, I promise) didn’t work out, we did visit two other houses: Rembrandt and Van Loon (yes, that’s a real name), both of which are ‘from’ the 17th century and were included in our City Card. Of course, everything in the Rembrandt House Museum was a reproduction, but the accompanying audio tour made it interesting, speaking to the way people lived in Rembrandt’s time, how many wives he had, things like that.

The Museum Van Loon is the former home of Ferdinand Bol, who was a pupil of Rembrandt’s. In the 19th Century, the Van Loon family, who have left their mark throughout Dutch history—including co-founding the Dutch East-India Company—moved in and lived there until 1945. It’s an opulent home with beautiful gardens and a coach house, which serves coffee, tea, and pie. If you need a break from walking along the canals, this is a lovely place to stop and have a cuppa.

Our City Card came with a free ride on the Hop-On-Hop-Off canal boat. It’s exactly like the Hop-On-Hop-Off bus you may have seen or experienced in New York, London, or Paris, but without wheels. While this was an easy way to take to the canals, it served more as a mode of transportation than a complete canal cruise experience.

Therefore, we booked an additional (which cost extra) boat cruise where we could really get the lay of the land, er, water. We went with Those Dam Boat Guys—clever, right?! TDBG, as I will call them, offers ‘alternative’ canal cruises. What this means is that it’s less structured than your standard boat tour where you pass each landmark and the guide provides information in rehearsed (if not pre-recorded) detail.

Our captain provided a very relaxed, familiar atmosphere. She based the discussion around what we were interested in learning, while still being sure to touch on things that she felt were important. We were in great mixed company comprised of study abroad students, a family from Hamburg, and a couple from Washington, D.C. I felt like we saw and learned so much in that short time without it being dry (though we stayed dry, as the captain ensured smooth sailing).

Visit 3 Amsterdam Museums in the order that I liked them:

1. Van Gogh Museum: I thoroughly enjoyed this museum and recommend booking a timeslot online in advance (they do this for crowd control) as well as purchasing the audio-visual tour devices. The latter definitely enhanced the experience, especially for an art history geek like me. This a great stop, whether you know a lot about Van Gogh, or just the crazy ear story.
2. Hermitage Amsterdam: Not that I’ve ever been, but I don’t think this Hermitage is quite like the one in St. Petersburg. That said, it does have some cool exhibits including an interactive “The Night Watch” light show of sorts.
3. Rijksmuseum: Just a hop away from the Van Gogh Museum and I Amsterdam sign, this humongous place is considered the best museum in A’dam. Having visited the Hermitage and Van Gogh museums prior, though, I felt like I had seen some form of most of the ‘famous stuff’ here already. If you want to see Rembrandt’s “The Night Watch” in all its glory, though, this is where you do it.

I can’t pronounce “Cuyp”, but I can say that this long-running street market is where the good stuff is. And by good stuff, I mean herring and other raw fish. I suggest trying a traditional rollmop: a skin-on slice of pickled herring rolled around pickles and pickled onions—deeeeelicious. My partner opted for tuna and salmon sashimi, which is also fine and very Dutch. In addition to delicacies of the sea, the market has stalls with clothing, gifts, toiletries, fresh-squeezed juices, and world-famous stroopwafel (syrup waffle).