This weekend I ventured out of warm, sunny Spain for the first time during my study abroad semester and headed north to cold and cloudy Amsterdam. I completely fell in love with the city after this weekend and definitely plan to return at some point in the future.
Day 1 – Friday
We arrived into Amsterdam Schipol airport early Friday morning, and went straight to our hotel to check in. The e hotel was located on the outskirts of Amsterdam, only 15 minutes from the airport, as this was the cheapest option we had when booking our housing the trip. We took a 9 minute train from the airport to Amsterdam Centraal station. We headed out to explore, and walked around Dam Square, eventually leading us to a flower market and the infamous “I Amsterdam” sign in front of the stunning Rijkmuseum. We stumbled upon a charming café called “Gruter” and decided to have lunch there. I decided to try my first authentic Dutch food, and ordered a vegetarian “Flammkuchen.” It’s essentially a super thin-crust pizza topped with a French cream, onions, and whichever toppings (in my case, I got it with arugula and mushrooms).
After eating lunch, we decided to continue exploring and walked to Vondelpark. We went back to the hotel for a quick Spanish ‘siesta’, and then took the train back to the city to go to the Heineken Experience. The museum was interesting and highly interactive, and the free beer at the end was a huge added bonus. We were starving afterwards so we went to a nearby pub called “O’Donnell’s” and had an incredible burger with fries for dinner.
Day 2 – Saturday
We took the train into the city around 10:30 in the morning. The first stop was Ten Kate Markt, an outdoor market with plenty of fresh local produce, cheeses and breads, and street food. Parallel to it was a place called Foodhallen, which was exactly what it sounds like – an indoors food market. This was a more upscale, hip, modern food market with an overwhelming variety of food to choose from – tacos, middle eastern food, dumplings, fish, sushi, vegan, etc. I decided to go with a sushi burrito and it was delicious. We spent majority of the rest of the day in the Jordaan District, which is crowded with beautiful houses, original shops, and of course, canals and bikes. The infamous Anne Frank house is located here as well. Unfortunately, I did not get the chance to go inside as tickets had sold out over two weeks ago, but even seeing it from the outside was unbelievable. Afterwards, we went on an hour-long canal tour of the city, which is one of my favorite activities that I did the entire weekend and would definitely recommend if you are traveling to Amsterdam. We got to see almost the entirety of the city through the canals, with an accompanied audio guide explaining the rich history of each neighborhood we passed through. After the canal tour, we walked around the Red Light District and grabbed dinner at an Italian restaurant.
We ended our weekend in Amsterdam the best possible way – Amsterdam Music Festival. The lineup was stacked with big DJ names such as David Guetta, Dimitri Vegas and Like Mike, Axwell and Ingrosso, and more. Also, at the stroke of midnight, the world’s #1 DJ was announced, being followed by a performance by them, and this year it ended up being one of my all-time favorite DJs, Martin Garrix. The festival lasted from 10pm until 6am, and every moment of it was incredible. The high-energy crowd was filled with concert-goers from countries all around the world, music bringing us all together for one night in one incredible city. Thank you Amsterdam, for the unforgettable weekend -- I will definitely be back.