Amsterdam's historic canals are always photogenic and can help you stay oriented as you explore. Photo / Thinkstock
Amsterdam's historic canals are always photogenic and can help you stay oriented as you explore. Photo / Thinkstock
Explore Amsterdam on foot or bike. It's a great way to see a city that heaves with history and life, writes Mike Corder.
The Dutch capital is best known for its pretty canals and magnificent museums including the Rijksmuseum and Van Gogh Museum. In fact, most of downtown Amsterdam looks like one huge open-air museum and strolling its streets costs you nothing. Here are some other ways to experience the city for free.
The Canals
Amsterdam's canals are over 400 years old and strolling along the waterways is a must-do. The scenery includes Golden Age mansions dating to the 17th century, converted warehouses and narrow buildings that sometimes look like they're ready to topple over sideways. The ring of canals starts with the Singel, which boasts a floating flower market. Then come the Herengracht, Keizersgracht and finally the Prinsengracht. Once you've worked up a thirst pounding the cobbled footpaths, stop off for a drink in one of the "brown cafes" - small bars named for their dark wooden interiors - along the canals or in the web of narrow alleys that interconnect them. If you visit the Red Light District (and most tourists do), you'll discover that it's also built around two historic canals, the Oudezijds Voorburgwal and Oudezijds Achterburgwal.
The clatter of trams and ringing of bicycle bells can be an assault on the ears, but there's a hidden oasis of peace in the heart of Amsterdam if you need a little quiet time. The Begijnhof is a small grassed courtyard surrounded by beautiful 17th and 18th century houses that were originally built for pious Catholic single women. It's right in the middle of town and reachable by a gateway at the end of a lane leading off one of the city's busiest shopping streets, but it is almost eerily silent. The courtyard also holds a small English Reformed Church and a Catholic chapel. If you don't manage to get into the Rijksmuseum to see Rembrandt's Night Watch, right around the corner from the Begijnhof is another hidden (and free) gem of the city, the Schuttersgalerij, or Civic Guards Gallery, of the Amsterdam Museum. This short covered passageway is home to - among other things -- a handful of much smaller portraits of civil guards similar in style, if not size, to Rembrandt's famous work.
The Begijnhof courtyard. Photo / Thinkstock
Vondelpark
The city's most famous park is just a stone's throw from Museum Square and a great place for a picnic. The 47ha park has ponds, tree-lined pathways, kids' playgrounds, an open-air theatre and cafes. You can rent inline skates, but it's mainly just a great place to lay down a blanket and sit for an hour or two watching the world go by. Look out for the Picasso sculpture of a fish in one of its meadows.
Twilight in Vondelpark. Photo / Thinkstock
Eye
One of Amsterdam's newer landmarks is a stark, white film institute, called the Eye perched on northern bank of the Ij waterway. You have to pay to take in a movie, but the cafe and its terrace are open to all who are prepared to buy a cup of coffee or light meal and offer a front-row seat to watch barges chug along the Ij against a backdrop of the city skyline. Remember that Amsterdam, at its heart, is a busy port. Getting there is another of the city's unsung pleasures - you squeeze on to a free commuter ferry usually crammed with cyclists from behind Central Station.
Markets
Amsterdam's wealth began in its port with the merchants who bought and sold everything from tulip bulbs to spices from the East Indies. A little of that mercantile past can still be seen at the city's many markets. The most famous is the Albert Cuyp food market in the Pijp neighbourhood, which sells, as the city website puts it, everything from cheese to bicycle chains, six days a week. The prettiest is the Noordermarkt, a sort of grower's market that sets up each Saturday outside the historic Noorderkerk church, next to the Prinsengracht canal. The best flea market is at Waterloo Square every day except Sunday close to the Amstel River.
CHECKLIST
Getting there:Cathay Pacific flies daily from Auckland to Amsterdam.
