The Amalegro bliss ended today with an early afternoon arrival in Amsterdam. Although the last part of the trip covers a long distance, ships make fast progress on the Rhine (a big river with no locks) and on the Rhine-Amsterdam canal whuch only has two locks. Travelmarvel continued to look after us with an included canal and bus tour of the city. After dinner Cherie, the Cruise Director took us on a walk to the red-light district - not really worth seeing, and as it started raining quite heavily we got wet, even though Bill had an umbrella and Kim a raincoat. We then started packing and tried to get to bed early.
Next day, after saying our goodbyes to new friends, we left the 'mother ship' and walked across to our previously booked hotel who allowed us into our room despite our being very early. (While on the ship it was pouring with rain but fortunately it stopped mid-morning so we had a dry day.) We then got some admin out of the way including buying train tickets for the trip to Ieper (Belgium) cashing some traveller's cheques (more difficult than it should have been), and visiting Vodafone to try and get some help with Kim's 'Hungary' phone (unsuccessful!). A great afternoon with general sightseeing using our 24 hr public transport ticket, and a most pleasant visit to the Van Gogh Museum where we paid extra for an interactive audio that we carried with us. So not only can you see many of Van Gogh's works, but you get a real sense for the various stages of his life. Another highlight of the day was buying sandwiches for lunch, a nice change after two weeks of being spoilt by Amalegro's chef. We also found a lovely patisserie with 'killer' steps to the 'WC' and also learnt that there is a difference between a cafe (sells coffee) and a coffee shop from which strange aromas emanate.
Amsterdam observations - sunscreen would not be a big seller as they apparently don't see the sun often here. With 680,000 bicycles, a tourist has to be ever vigilant to avoid being bicycled over. With an increasing population there are long waiting lists for rental properties (years apparently) and there is always pressure to reclaim land. People speak good English and appear to be more friendly than Germans. There's not many green areas in the city centre but the canals make for an attractive city. And lastly there's a nice 'feel' to the city.
PS. After spending another day in Amsterdam we saw that the city is also quite dirty with the everpresent cigarette butts and although the people are friendly there's also an element of seediness in the city centre. Perhaps as a result of them being very liberal?