Day 6: Vondel Park, central Amsterdam, and Venice!

 We had had enough of museums, so today was a walk in the park—Vondel Park, one of the largest in Amsterdam, with lots of walking trails, water, and green space. What a pleasure to walk there after the noisy bustle and crowds of people on buses, in museums and restaurants. The pictures say more than I can:







We ate lunch in the park, watched the many dogs frisk and play (great to see them run!), and found a bench on which to read our books. The most relaxing day on our trip.

I have to add some pictures of clouds. We’ve seen so many Dutch landscape paintings where the clouds dominate and have a surreal, ethereal quality. I thought it was painterly imagination until I saw that there is a different quality to the light, perhaps due to water vapor in the air coming off the sea.



Then we headed out to see Station Centraal, stopping first to visit the Begijnhof, a circle of old and well-preserved houses in a quiet courtyard, where for centuries single and widowed Catholic women lived and worked among the poor (like nuns but not taking vows). Single women still live there today, working for the church. A very peaceful spot.





We ended in the heart of old Amsterdam, the central bus and train station designed by Cuyper in the 1800s. (He also designed the Rijksmuseum.) A marvel.


After another Heinicken stop (okay I had one too),


we visited St. Nicholas’ Church and happened on an evensong rehearsal that was exquisite.


After walking more of the canals, now thronged with people enjoying the fine fall weather and the start of the weekend, we hopped the bus back to our XO Hotel Blue Square, picked up our luggage, and headed out to the airport for a 10 p.m. flight. We arrived in plenty of time but were shocked to see lines stretching almost a quarter of a mile long for some check-in counters (and that was just check-in, not security!) After attaching ourselves to one of those lines, we did a little more research and found that the EasyJet counter had only a handful of people in line. Fortunately that was our airline. So glad we didn’t waste two hours standing in a line we didn’t belong in.

The flight to Venice was uneventful, though when we landed—close to midnight—we couldn’t find the driver who was supposed to take us to our hotel. Fortunately he arrived eventually, and we were ferried to Hotel President in the dark, curious to see what our surroundings would look like in daylight. To be continued…..


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