Walking Tours and other Amsterdam, Netherlands Things to Do Tips

I strongly recommend the New Amsterdam Free Tour. If this is your first time visiting, this is a fun tour to get an introduction to the city. The tour guides are young and hip, and are native English speakers. There is definitely a young crowd bent to this tour. I think partly because it advertises in the hostels and on the internet. However, the tour provides good historic context with great stories throughout.

Yes, the tour is free, but tips are welcome (and maybe even expected) at the end of the 3 hour tour. I would say that people typically tip between 5 to 10 Euros (and some clearly less), but I enjoyed it so much I tipped 20 Euros. It was the best value I received on my entire Europe trip.

There are two tours daily at 11:00 AM and 3:00 PM. The tour takes around the main sites in Old Amsterdam. They also have two additional paid tours which I also highly recommend. The Red Light Tour and the Pub Crawl were definite highlights of my visit to Amsterdam. You can get more information about these tours during the free tour. Look for my other tip on the Pub Crawl.

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Directions: There's two meeting places for the start of this tour. Officially, they meet next to the Tourist Information Center in front of Centraal Station. However, if you are closer to Dam Square (Damrak), you can meet there.
Website: www.newamsterdamtours.com

The first time I went to Amsterdam, I had no desire to visit the Anne Frank House. Not that I wasn't interested, I just had so many other things I wanted to check out first. However, this time around I decided to check out the neighborhood of Jordaan and the Anne Frank House before lunch. I'm glad that I did. The history is very interesting, and being led through the back of the factory where the Frank family hid away was a truly an emotional experience. Yes, there are long lines, but I think the typical wait time is around 45 - 60 minutes. To walk through the various rooms with stories (on TVs) and exhibits, I would say it took another hour. In total about 2 hours to experience the Anne Frank House.

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Phone: +31-20-5567100
Address: Prinsengracht 267
Website: http://www.annefrank.nl