Amsterdam to Antwerp

With a free morning on Thursday before we were being picked up for the ship, we went to the Rijks Museum which is the national art museum and reopened in 2013 after a major renovation. It is a good size to see  in a few hours and has an excellent collection of paintings from all eras including those by Vermeer, Van Gogh and Rubens. There is also an excellent collection of furniture, carvings, ceramics and other items.

We arrived at our ship, the Amastella around 3.30 PM. The cruise is through Botanica who do garden themed tours of various sorts. This cruise is in conjunction with APT and our ship is only 6 weeks old so has the latest technology. We have one of the larger cabins which is very good. The cruise includes all food, drink, tours and Wi-Fi. There are several experts on board covering art history, garden design and European garden history. The talks both on board and during tours have been very good. One who some might know is Dr Toby Musgrave who has published several books and appeared as the garden historian on Monty Don's garden shows on ABC and SBS.

On Friday morning, the ship stayed in Amsterdam and we had a choice of a canal cruise or a trip to the botanical gardens at the University of Utrecht which we did. The gardens were very good with a wide range of plants some in bloom and others yet to reach their best. In the afternoon, we sailed to Hoorn and did a walking tour of Edam (with cheese tasting) and Volendam, a fishing town.

On Saturday, we arrived in Arnhem (famous for the battle for "The Bridge too Far") and had a choice of a war museum or the Het Loo palace and gardens. Het Loo was a residence of the Dutch royal family until 1962 when the state took it over and it is now open to the public. It is a baroque building and garden and quite ornate for the Netherlands although not as ostentatious as Versailles or some other palaces. There are some photos on this site.

Today, Sunday, we arrived in Antwerp and had a walking tour this morning and a tasting tour (waffles, beer and chocolate) this afternoon. Antwerp has some interesting architecture and statues and is quite a compact city to get around. The bell tower on the cathedral is one of the highest in Europe and very ornate. The weather has got colder and it rained and hailed on and off this morning with sunny breaks and more sun this afternoon.  We had to buy a beanie and gloves for Boris as it is colder than we expected.

The ship can hold 170 passengers but there are only 117 on board plus the experts and Botanica staff. The food is very good and wine reasonably in quality. The passengers are mostly from Australia with a few New Zealanders and a couple from Calgary in Canada. We shared our complimentary bottle of Veuve Clliquot champagne with them last night in our cabin.

We head off tonight for Ghent and the highlight of the trip, the Floralies flower show.