Museums and fun around town

Ah Amsterdam! Now that we've started to find our way around, we're eager to get around and see more of the city. With this being our last full day (and the weather being pretty miserable), we opted to go and take a famous canal ride tour, then go down to Museimplein and see a few museums.

The canal ride tour was pretty neat. We got to see much of the canal network in a much warmer fashion. Consider the amount of rain and snow we'd endured the previous day, riding around in a warm boat was the way to go. During the tour, we found the Houseboat Museum that escaped us yesterday (jeez - it was a half kilometer farther away then I'd expected). I was also on the lookout for a the famous Cat Houseboat, where many of the city's stray cats gather. We found the right canal, but had no luck finding the cats. Ah well - another time!

Next stop - the Vincent Van Gogh museum. Several famous Van Gogh works are here, but many of the most recognizable pieces are the Met and other galleries.

After the Van Gogh museum, we headed over to the Rembrandt museum. There were works from his many pupils and a few other contemporaries. The Dutch have a special, nationalistic sense of pride in the art and museums of Amsterdam. Each museum felt like I was at a major gallery, not a little, podunk place. Needless to say, I was very impressed.

In our short stay in Amsterdam, we'd seen many stands selling French fries. The potant, as the Dutch call it, has been worked into a real homemade delicacy. Thanks to our guide book, we were told the best homemade fries in Amsterdam were at VleminckX, on the edge of Muntplein. We managed to arrive just before they closed and score some nifty fries. Needless to say, it was a great snack.

Working our way back towards our tram, we stopped by a (recommended) Indonesia restaurant. The appetizers alone were more than enough to make a great dinner. Considering how early we'd have to catch our flight to India in the morning, a quick dinner sounded like a great plan.

Now, it's time to pack and get ourselves out to the airport. Thanks to the network of trams and metro rails, we should be able to navigate ourselves back to Schipol and get on our way. Next stop - New Delhi!