I spent the following two days going to Amsterdam to take in the city. I had been recommended to have a look at the Rijksmuseum so that was my first stop on my tour. I had planned on spending a few hours looking around before continuing on, but when I left I had spent more than 5½ hours just walking around. With a small number of statues but primarily paintings it was surprisingly interesting, but personally I was the most impressed by the 1600-1700 floor. Plenty of classics by many more local painters that was seen in Mauritshuis together with numerous Dutch and Flemish painters. The density of artists in the Netherlands is – or has been – quite impressive. Van Gogh, Vermeer, Rembrandt, van de Velde are probably among the better known, but they were a mere fraction of the total collection. The Night Watch by Rembrandt is probably the best known at the museum and they are currently working on restoring it to its former glory. During the painting’s earlier years, the painting had been moved and because the new location had less space, they had removed parts of the painting to make it fit. They are now currently in the works of restoring the lost parts, basing themselves mainly – as I understood – on a smaller copy made before it had been “adjusted”. A lot of computerwork, AI, and three employees with a microscope were set in motion as part of the restoring process.
Leaving the museum I circled the center following the canals, passing Anne Frank’s house, before finally finding the right road that brought me back to the station to get back to Leiden.
On returning to Amsterdam on my second day there I did a quick pass past the royal palace before heading East, opposite the Rijksmuseum. I didn’t have anything planned so I decided to just have a walk around, trying to get myself lost in the many narrow streets among old buildings, endless bicycles and the occasional sweet aroma hanging in the air.
I found myself at a new part on the roof of Nemo, the city’s technical science museum. From here you could see along the rooftops towards the center and towering Oude Kerk (“Old Church”).
After a short break I continued on and shortly after passed by the Versetsmuseum (Defense Museum). It was different compared to other similar WW2 museums in that they solely showed the war through the eyes of the civilians and ignored the actual armies and fighting that didn’t directly involve civilians. From here I continued, passed by the botanical garden without even noticing, and after a bit of confusion I ended up in front of Rembrandt’s house museum. I realized that the museum wasn’t about his paintings but rather how life was when he grew up and the effect he had on his students’ and others’ paintings so I ended up skipping it. With a bit more zig-zagging I found myself passing through the red light district (being daytime there was nothing obvious going on), continued confusing myself before finally finding my way back to the station and on a train back to Leiden.
I hadn’t been able to get dinner until 2000 the previous nights, so returning to Leiden at 1730 today I thought I’d be able to get something to eat a bit earlier. Yet, all the places I had a look at turned out to be popular and fully booked. So it still turned into 1930 before I found a nice small place that made some delicious burgers.
If I want to be able to get a pasta dinner tomorrow so I can still manage to get some relaxation and good sleep before the run on Sunday I’ll probably need to book a table in advance to be sure to have somewhere to go.
No comments:
Post a Comment