‘Coffee’ Shops and the Red-light District

You tell people you’re moving to Amsterdam and the first thing they say is “Oh I see, you’re going for the ‘coffee’ shops and red-light district, wink wink nudge nudge”. Monty Python reference aside, while this is what Amsterdam is well known for, once you get here you realise it’s actually a small part of the whole.

When my girlfriend and I first visited we managed to walk though the red-light district without even noticing (we then back-tracked just to satisfy our curiosity, but it turned out to be mostly full of stoned or drunk English men stumbling from one window to the next). The main area itself is quite small and easy to avoid, although there are smaller mini versions dotted around the city which you can accidentally wander into but it’s all fairly tame by today’s standards.

The coffee shops are of course everywhere like cafes in most other cities but more often than not people seem to just be there for the coffee oddly enough. So one of the nice things about Amsterdam is that you can really make it what you want it to be, I suppose that comes from it being such a tolerant and accepting nation. If you're really that way inclined you can of course skip the coffee shops and just DIY as shown in the photo.

One thing I found out recently is that The Netherlands has more great museums per square foot than anywhere else in the world! And for 40 euros you can buy a Museum Card (Museumkaart) which lets you into 29 of them in Amsterdam (and hundreds more elsewhere) as many times as you like for a year. You can buy it at some of the museums or at Uitburo at Leidseplein 26. If you’re already living in Amsterdam then you can buy it online at the link above.