Wrapping Things Up in Amsterdam

Thursday to Wednesday , September 24 to 30

Our cruise ended in Amsterdam.  Avalon provided a canal cruise, which was fun--who wouldn't enjoy zipping around Amsterdam's canals, lined with gabled brick houses, arched bridges, and steeples and towers?  We followed that with a walking tour and a soggy walk back to our ship.

Since we planned to stay almost another week in Amsterdam, the cold, wet, and blustery weather gave us an excuse to have a quiet afternoon onboard and make a serious start on our packing.

We disembarked right after breakfast Friday morning.  It was a time for last-minute well wishes to people we'd met.  Chuck and Kathe headed for the airport, where they would be based for 2 nights.  We headed downtown to drop off our bags at our hotel.

To get acquainted, we walked through our new neighborhood and along several of the canals that are a part of this district known as the Jordaan.  

We stopped in to see Westerkerk, the large church that is a landmark in this part of town.  Gorgeous from the outside, it is very spare on the interior--a trademark of Dutch Reformed churches.  No stained glass or artwork.  The focus is on the pulpit.

We tried our first pannenkoeken (Dutch pancake), this one with cheese, ham, and apple.  It's something between a crepe and a yeasty pancake.  Very tasty and great texture.

We returned to Westerkerk for a free Friday afternoon organ concert.

The highlight of our day Saturday was a walk north to the weekly farmers market by Noorderkerk (the North Church).  We thought it would be fun to see a city market, and it was a bit more than we expected.  For one thing, people come from all over for the organic foods, so it was humming and crowded, bicycles everywhere.  Breads, cheeses, butchers, fruits and vegetables.  But it's also part flea market (lots of vintage clothing and some antiques) and part Portland Saturday Market (jewelry, pillows, pottery).  Made for some very fun wandering and people watching.  Being Amsterdam, we even came across a purveyor of marijuana lollipops.

Sunday was the beginning of our visits to some of Amsterdam's art museums. We had read that waiting lines could be a bit daunting on weekends, so we thought we'd visit the Stedelijk, the contemporary art museum, which we thought would be less popular than the more well-known Van Gogh and Rijks Museums.  Even so, we bought online tickets for all three museums to minimize the long-line issue.

A view of all three museums in the Museum Quarter, the Stedelijk at the left, Van Gogh the two buildings in the middle, and the Rijks at the right:

We loved the Stedelijk, one of the more interesting art museums we've visited.  While there were some unusual and cutting edge pieces, for sure, we also got to feast our eyes on Picasso, Kandinsky, Miro, Mondrian, Matisse, and Chagall--not too bad, and there was an easy flow to the layout.

A "little" Matisse, anyone?

Outside, on the Museumplein (museum square), between the Van Gogh and the Rijks, were dozens of food carts and many, many artisan booths, and thousands of people.  It was a scene and provided great people-watching opportunities.  We passed up the hemp burger stand called Come Hungry Leave Happy, but we had read that getting fries from stands is a very Dutch thing to do.  After watching a young man cutting up potatoes, sacks of potatoes at his feet, and another young man frying them up, we decided to give them a try.  They weren't ever going to be any fresher than this.  Only in the name of traveler research, of course.  And we did scratch any notion of having lunch off our plan.

They were every bit as good as they looked and smelled.  A worthwhile treat for sure.

On Monday, our focus was on taking a day trip outside Amsterdam.  We took the tram to Centraal Station and bought tickets to Delft.  We had a little excitement getting onto the train.  I discovered just before our train was due to arrive that the ticket had to be scanned before departing.  No scanning machines to be seen, I asked a man nearby where to do it.  He pointed downstairs to the main station.  I made pretty good tracks getting down there.  I had to ask two people where to scan before I found the right place.  (Obvious once you know, of course.) Back upstairs in time to jump onto the train.  Oops!  We like to think we know our way around, but you always have to be in the learning mode when you're traveling about. Then we sat back and watched the suburbs and countryside go by.  We went through Haarlem and Den Haag (The Hague).  There were lots of commuters headed for Den Haag and Rotterdam (the stop after ours).

The Delft area is the area from which Jerry's Huyser ancestor emigrated.  The small town he came from has been subsumed into a largish city about 10km from Delft, so this was our representative visit to "homeland."  Delft is a very charming town, with a large central square.  The old city hall and the "New" Church (this one filled with a raft of historic stained glass) bookend the square, which is lined with shops and cafes.  There are small canals and bridges and even a windmill at the far end of town.

On Tuesday, we had a morning date with Van Gogh (the only museum that lets you pick a specific date and time for your visit) and visited the Rijksmuseum after.  That's a lot of art museums at one time, but doable.  We covered the Van Gogh in full and hit all the requisite highlights (plus quite a bit more) of the Rijks.

We had another engagement at 5:00pm.  We had booked a canal cruise on the very historic wooden canal boat owned by our hotel.  (Churchill once cruised the canals of Amsterdam in this boat.)  We spent 1-1/2 hours on multiple canals and in the harbor, going past many sights and historic spots.  The boat now sports an electric motor, so there are no diesel fumes.  She recharges overnight and can go 10 hours on a charge.  This seemed a nice almost-end to our Amsterdam visit.

Our focus is now shifting to a little final sightseeing and packing up.  We head home tomorrow.  Much as we have learned to enjoy our Amsterdam neighborhood and finding just right places for coffee or tapas or (wonderful) pizza, we will be pretty darned happy to be home too.

Cologne

Wednesday, September 23

We sailed from Bonn at dawn and arrived in Cologne by breakfast time.  Our time of cruising is winding down, as Cologne is our last stop before we arrive in Amsterdam.

It was a very cool and wet morning.  Chuck, Kathe, Jerry, and I walked from our ship toward Cologne's cathedral.  Our first landmark was the Hohenzollern Bridge, the world's busiest railway bridge according to my guidebook.  It was destroyed in WWII and rebuilt in its original style.  Just like in Paris, it is covered in padlocks placed by lovers to symbolize their never-ending love.  (The band of gray that looks like a solid railing is actually an open railing covered in the padlocks.)

We could see the spires of the cathedral just inland from the riverfront, so it looked like it would be an easy approach.  Thanks to myriad construction projects, it was anything but straightforward.  Our route involved a few stops and starts and a little backtracking, but we made our way.  When you have such a huge landmark, you will eventually persevere.  And it is huge!  It is immediately adjacent to the train station, making for an Odd Couple of big buildings.  

Much of the exterior was covered in scaffolding and netting.  Unfortunately, so was some of the interior.  And other parts were gated off.  We couldn't walk the perimeter and view side chapels, etc.  Even some of the most noted aspects--such as the Shrine of the Magi-- were not in view and blocked off.  Disappointing, but the overwhelming size of the place still had its impact.

Cologne suffered severe bombing damage in WWII, and the cathedral itself was hit by 15 bombs.  It's structure survived and its glass and other treasured items had been removed before the bombing.

This is the front half!

Part of the main entrance:

The Gero-Crucifix, carved in 970 AD, a favorite stop of pilgrims:

The grand interior, with a 140-foot ceiling:

After this visit, Chuck and Kathe peeled off to see the train station. We headed for the Alter Markt (Old Market Square) and the City Hall, "the only historic facade left standing after the 1945 bombings," says our guidebook.

We walked back to the boat along the riverfront park.  We set sail at 1:00pm and would sail through the night to our final destination: Amsterdam.  We had an afternoon briefing on the history and mindset of The Netherlands.  

Dusk along the Lower Rhine:

Our evening was capped off with the Farewell Gala Dinner--lots of special treats, including lobster, and, of course, finishing off with the ceremonial Baked Alaska and crew "parade."

Rudesheim and the Romantic Rhine

Tuesday, September 22

We started off this gray, damp day by taking the provided transport into the town of Rudesheim and then walking around on our own.  It is a charming, cobblestoned town filled with weinstubes (wine restaurants or gardens), grapevines strung over the lanes, and vineyards on the hills behind the town.  

It was very quiet as things weren't open yet.  We bumped into a few tour groups walking through town, but other than them it felt like a very sleepy town.  We were told, however, that Rudesheim gets 3 million visitors each year.  Not many in evidence this day, which is okay.

After lunch, we sailed once more.  This was to be one of the true highlights of the cruise--our trip through what's known as the Romantic Rhine.  All those TV commercials of river cruises plying a narrow, winding river, steep hills of vineyards and castles on either side.  Our weather timing was off, and for the key couple of hours as we passed this beautiful area, we had solid rain and even fog at times.  It was still beautiful, but not the clear-skied vision we had in our heads.  Most of us were huddled indoors, peering out, with occasional bursts of eager photographers running outside to take pictures, getting a little damper each time.

Shortly after we passed the famous Lorelei area, the sun broke out for awhile.  We moved to the sky deck of the boat and enjoyed the views.  The rain came back, and most of us settled for watching the remainder of the day's cruise from the warmth (and dryness) of the lounge.

We sailed on to Bonn for the night.  This was the only night of our cruise when we were docked overnight rather than cruising.

We ended our day with a great concert by a trio called La Strada, who had driven from Ghent to share their music with us.  Two very talented violinists and an equally good guitarist.  At first, we thought it seemed an odd combination, but the guitar added some nice depth and rhythm to the nimble-fingered violin playing.

Miltenberg

Monday, September 21

We arrived on a foggy morning in Miltenberg.  As the fog lifted, we discovered hills we didn't suspect.

Rather than taking the guided walking tour of Miltenberg, we decided to simply walk through it on our own. It was described by our cruise director as having one main street with a couple parallel streets, so it was pretty easy to tackle.

Miltenberg is filled with a jumble of timbered houses and shops, some dating back hundreds of years.  And, of course, lots of cobblestones.

The town has lots of buildings made of the stone seen in the local cliffs, a distinctive pink granite.  The bridge is also made of it.  This bridge was built in the 1950's, replacing the one destroyed in WWII.

The forecast was for a cool day, but clear and sunny, so the crew had planned a special treat: a grill lunch on the sun deck.  There was limited availability, but Chuck had snagged us seats the night before.  Though wurst, minute steaks, and salmon were available, cheeseburgers were clearly the most popular items.  We also had salads and corn on the cob, finishing off with ice cream sundaes.  A little unexpected but fun.  It was nice sitting outside and watching the river activity, including one of our sister ships passing by--the Avalon Visionary--which set off a flurry of greeting horns and waving crew and passengers on both ships.

We set sail soon after lunch.  Because of some upcoming low bridges, the crew had to clear the sun deck.  "Clear the sun deck" means take it down to the floor--no canopies, no chairs and tables, no railings.

No sooner had we sailed than we encountered our next lock.

And this one included a dam--low-head hydro, Jerry told me--and a substation.

It was a time of gentle cruising down the Main.  We sat in the bow and watched the afternoon go by.  Lots of locks, of course (9 before our next docking Tuesday morning).  Lots of fishermen along the banks.  Lots of caravans (trailers) in camping clubs, which we've seen by the dozens, especially in this area along the gentle Main.  Lots of ducks, herons, and swans.

In late afternoon, we had a zither concert.  This may sound odd, but it was both entertaining and very interesting.  The zither is an unusual and very complicated instrument.  Our zither master took the time to explain how the instrument is played and had a camera on his hands so we could see what movements resulted in the sounds we were hearing.

But, wait, there was even more entertainment on tap.  After dinner we got to see the Crew Talent Show.  And there was an array of talents displayed.  We had a group perform Gangnam style, which was energetic and fun to watch.  One of our waiters turned out to be a very good break dancer.  We had singers and guitar players, including our captain.  And we finished with an excellent tango.  Who knew our receptionist and maitre d' were so talented?  As a rousing finale, they played "YMCA" and had both crew and passengers dancing and singing.  A loud, noisy, fun evening.

Our captain: