Day 4
Museum Day….. like any major city, Amsterdam is saturated
with museums and, given that we are 4 days into an 8 week trip covering some of
the most historical cities in Europe I have tried to be quite selective about
where we visit. I reluctantly axed the
Rijksmuseum from the list, and with it went Rembrandt Haus and the Amsterdam Museum. I was trying to find museums that we were
unlikely to replicate the content of in cities further along on this trip. I settled on three for today… the National
Maritime Museum, the Dutch Resistance Museum and the Museum of Bags &
Purses.
There’s a little bakery directly across the road that we’d
not noticed before so first stop was there for breakfast then onto our trusty
tram #2 and into Centraal. The Maritime
Museum is on the water just a 5min bus ride from there. Housed in a stunning building dating from 1656
it covers the history of Dutch marine exploration, and includes a stunning
collection of Atlases, model yachts, and paintings of Dutch naval battles. You can also imagine being a sailor via the
full sized replica of the ‘Amsterdam’ which travelled between the Netherlands
and the East Indies during the 18th century.
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| The Atlas Room |
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| This little cutie is a model of a boat designed for ice sailing -check out the blades on the outriggers |
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| The Dutch Royal Barge |
Next stop was the Dutch Resistance Museum which chronicled
life for the Dutch during the German occupation in WW2.
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| Ingenious ways to smuggle info out |
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| When the Germans banned and jammed Radio Orange from the Dutch Government in exile broadcasting from the UK people made 'unjammers' |
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| One Dutch family hid a downed US airman in the bottom of a pulpit |
After this we stopped for lunch at a little canal side pub
for toasted sandwiches and beer/coffee.
It had the coolest beer tap ever.
Then it was off to the Museum of Bags & Purses. Tony declined the offer to venture in and I
spent ages drooling. Their collection is
housed in a beautiful old canal house and contains items from as early as the
17th century right up to the present time. Pictures will have to do cos I don’t have a
thousand words.
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| A handbag lamp - just what every girl needs |
And I told SInterklaus I'd been a very good girl when we met him and a couple of his helpers on our way back from the Bags & Purses Museum.
Tomorrow we’re off to Haarlem and then a visit to the MH17
memorial.
Wow, you're the first person I know who's actually gone to the museum of bags and purses!
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