The Rough Guides' Amsterdam Directions 2 (Rough Guide Directions)

193 Pages·2007·4.8 MB·English

by  Rough Guides

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Rough Guide DIRECTIONS
Amsterdam

Amsterdam
DIRECTIONS
WRITTEN AND RESEARCHED BY
Martin Dunford, Phil Lee
and Karoline Densley
NEW YORK • LONDON • DELHI
www.roughguides.com

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Contents
C
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Introduction 4 Accommodation 133 N
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Hotels .............................................135
Hostels ...........................................143
Ideas 9
The big six ........................................10
Canalside Amsterdam .......................12 Essentials 145
Shopping ..........................................14
Arrival .............................................147
Museums and galleries .....................16
City transport ..................................147
Bars ..................................................18
Information and maps .....................150
Restaurants ......................................20
Festivals and events ......................151
Coffee shops ....................................22
Entertainment and nightlife .............153
Budget accommodation ....................24
Drugs .............................................155
Green Amsterdam .............................26
Directory .........................................155
Clubbers’ Amsterdam .......................28
Kids’ Amsterdam ..............................30
Dutch art ..........................................32
Chronology 157
Architecture ......................................34
Churches ..........................................36
Food and drink .................................38
Hotels ...............................................40
Musical Amsterdam ..........................42 Language 163
Places 45
small print & Index 169
The Old Centre .................................47
The Grachtengordel ..........................66
The Jordaan and Western docklands ...85
The Old Jewish Quarter and Eastern Colour maps
docklands ......................................94
The Museum Quarter and the Chapter locator map
Vondelpark ..................................108 Amesterdam
The outer districts...........................117 Amesterdam City Centre
Day-trips from Amsterdam .............126 Amesterdam trams, buses & the metro
4
Introduction to
Amsterdam
N
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C Amsterdam is the perfect city for a short visit or a
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D weekend break. It’s easy on the eye, with plenty (but not
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R too much) to see; it’s compact enough to explore mainly
T
N on foot; just about everyone speaks good-to-fluent Eng-
I lish, and more often than not more than a smattering of
French and German as well; and, last but not least, it’s a
city that likes to party.
But there’s much more to Amsterdam
than that. It’s a thoughtful city, with a
long-standing liberal tradition that has
given it a distinctive character, begin-
ning with the obvious – the legalized
prostitution and dope-smoking coffee-
shops – through to the more subtle,
encapsulated by Amsterdammers them-
selves in the Dutch word gezellig, which
roughly corresponds to a combination
of “cosy”, “lived-in” and “warmly con-
vivial”. Nowhere is this more applicable
than in the city’s unparalleled selection
When to visit
Amsterdam enjoys a fairly standard temperate climate, with
warm, if characteristically mild summers and moderately cold
and wet winters. The climate is certainly not severe enough
to make very much difference to the city’s routines, which
makes Amsterdam an ideal all-year destination. That said,
high summer – roughly late June to August – sees the city’s
parks packed to the gunnels and parts of the centre almost
overwhelmed by tourists, whereas spring and autumn are not
too crowded and can be especially beautiful, with mist hang-
ing over the canals and low sunlight beaming through the
cloud cover. Indeed, Amsterdam has more than its fair share
of cloudy days at any time of the year, but even in January
and February, when things can be at their gloomiest, there
are compensations – wet cobbles glistening under the street
lights and the canals rippled by falling raindrops. In the sum-
mer, from around June to August, mosquitoes can be bother-
some. At any time of the year, but particularly in summer, try
to book your accommodation well in advance.
Contents Introduction
5
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(cid:2) Shop in the “Nine Streets”, the Grachtengordel
of gezellig drinking establishments, whether you choose a traditional
brown café or one of the newer designer places. The city is also riding
something of a resurgent wave, with dozens of great new restaurants, a
vibrant arts scene, including the brand-new Muziekgebouw, and a club
scene that has come of age recently.
The layout of the city is determined
by a web of canals radiating out from
an historical core to loop right round
the centre in a “Girdle of Canals”, the
Grachtengordel. This planned, sev-
enteenth-century extension to the
medieval town makes for a uniquely
elegant urban environment, with tall
gabled houses refl ected in black-green
waters, a world away from the traf-
Contents Introduction
6
fi c and noise of many other European city centres. These charms are
supplemented by a string of fi rst-rate attractions, most notably the
Anne Frank Huis, the Rijksmuseum, with its wonderful collection of
Dutch paintings, including several of Rembrandt’s fi nest works, and
the peerless Van Gogh Museum, with the world’s largest collection of
the artist’s work.
N
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U ab
D led
O h
R ou
INT se in th
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Contents Introduction
Amsterdam
AT A GLANCE
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– tripled the city in size, and made
Amsterdam what it is today. When
anyone thinks of the city, it is
these elegant waterways, criss-
crossed by bridges, and flanked
by tall quirkily gabled houses, that
they have in mind.
(cid:5) Seven Bridges
(cid:4) Centraal Station
THE OLD CENTRE
Amsterdam’s old centre is the
city’s busiest quarter, with the
notorious Red Light District at its
heart. It has to be seen, but it’s
worth bearing in mind that this is
a business – rather than a tourist
– district, with a solid bedrock of
sleaze beneath the fun veneer.
THE JORDAAN AND
GRACHTENGORDEL WESTERN DOCKLANDS
The ultimate in thoughtful city In many ways this is the city cen-
planning, the Grachtengordel tre’s most appealing and restful
– basically the ring of canals that area, with some of the most grace-
was dug around the medieval ful stretches of the main canals
centre in the seventeenth century together with the more ramshackle
Contents Introduction
8
small waterways of the Jordaan, museums. It is also one of the
and the tall warehouses of the city’s plusher neighbourhoods,
former harbour area. All without with leafy streets, apartment
trams and traffic. blocks and upscale shops and res-
taurants – and some of the best of
the city’s moderately priced hotels.
N
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I THE OUTER DISTRICTS
T
C There’s not a lot to take you into
U
D Amsterdam’s outer districts,
O
R except perhaps for the increasingly
T gentrified De Pijp neighbourhood
N
I – worth visiting for its vibrant daily
market and growing number of
cool bars and restaurants.
OUTSIDE AMSTERDAM
Don’t forget that Holland is a small
country and that there are plenty of
compelling attractions very close at
hand – not least the small town of
Haarlem, with the great Frans Hals
Museum, and the stunning Keuken-
hof Gardens, among others.
(cid:4) Brouwersgracht houses
OLD JEWISH QUARTER AND
EASTERN DOCKLANDS
Amsterdam’s Jewish Quarter is not
what it was – most of its inhabit-
ants were deported during the
Nazi occupation, and it’s been
unsympathetically redeveloped
since then. But it holds a few
fascinating corners of Jewish and
wartime history as well as some
key one-off attractions like the
Rembrandthuis and the city’s zoo.
MUSEUM QUARTER
Unsurprisingly, this area, just south
of the city centre proper, is home
to the cream of Amsterdam’s (cid:4) Joods Historisch Museum
Contents Introduction