Filed under: museum, Shopping, top-feature, Tours
Walking Amsterdam: Anne Frank House and Prinsengracht
My favorite Amsterdam canal walk is along Prinsengracht or Prince’s canal. Along this canal is Anne Frank House, the house where Anne Frank hid from the Nazis. It is a modest building by Amsterdam standards, but with more than one million visitors a year, it is Amsterdam’s second most popular museum. Leafy Prinsengracht is named after William of Orange, forefather of the Dutch Royal family. The canal is crisscrossed by shopping streets and lined with charming cafes and canal houses with ornate gables. Join me for a stroll through this district and a visit to the Anne Frank House.
View from Westerkerk
START: Westermarkt, tram 13 or 17
LENGTH: one morning or one afternoon, but if shopping is your passion allow one full day.
FOOD & DRINK: cafes and restaurants are scattered along Prinsengracht and neighbouring streets
WHEN: Tuesday to Saturday, definitely not Sunday
TO VISIT:
- Westerkerk, a best bird’s eye view of Amsterdam from the clock tower
- Anne Frank House, the place where Anne Frank and her family lived in hiding for two years
- Pancake Bakery, the perfect lunch stop for pancakes as big as wagon wheels
- Tulip Museum, a riot of color and fragrance
- The Nine Streets, nine lanes brimful with boutiques fulfilling all your shopping wishes
THE TOUR BEGINS
Hop on tram 13 or 17 and get off at Westermarkt stop, easy to spot because the bridal-cake-shaped tower of Westerkerk dominates the square. The spire soars 85m (275ft) up in the sky and is Amsterdam’s tallest building.
Westerkerk
WESTERKERK AND REMBRANDT
The church interior is plain and bare, exactly what the Calvinist congregation wanted the church to be. The floor is a carpet of graves. Rembrandt was buried here in a paupers’ tomb. Although his death is recorded in the church register, the actual spot was not. It is not likely that his bones are still in the church because it was customary to clear paupers’ tombs after twenty years to make place for others.
Climb the tower for a bird’s eye view of Amsterdam, including a peek in the back garden of the Anne Frank House. The tour up the tower runs every thirty minutes and involves incredibly narrow staircases, some more like ladders. So wear appropriate footwear.
The tower is located at Prinsengracht 282 (map), and is open from April to November, closed on Sunday. Climbing the tower €6
ANNE FRANK HOUSE
At the corner of Westermarkt and Prinsengracht stands a bronze statue of Anne Frank. It captures her personality as we know it from her diary because with hands on her back she looks upward full of hope. The long line at the corner of Westermarkt indicates the entrance to the Anne Frank House.
Early morning of 4 August 1944, heavy steps reverberated on the staircase. As the whole family shrank with fear, an SS officer and Dutch Security Police members arrested the family. The family was put on transport, first to Auschwitz and then to Bergen-Belsen where Anne died in March 1945, 15 years old. But I am sure you are familiar with the history. Her diary has been translated into fifty-three languages and has never been out of print ever since its publication in 1947. Her dream of becoming famous came true, but not in the way she had wanted it.
The doorway to the hiding place is now permanently open. You will wonder how it was possible the family lived in such a confined space for two years. Restricted in their movements, there was no walking about, no loud talking, no flushing of the toilet. The office workers on the floor below mustn’t hear any sound from above. Evenings and weekends were slightly more relaxed, but there was always the fear of being discovered. With help from friends outside, they became an almost self-sufficient family.
Nothing is left of the original furniture that crammed the rooms. After the Nazis discovered the family, they removed all furniture. Walking through the empty house, pencil marks linger on the wall, indicating the growth of Anne and her elder sister Margot. Pins on a map of Europe tacked to the wall show the progress of the Allied Forces. In Anne’s room you get a glimpse of what she saw every day, posters on the wall, pictures of famous movie stars. This tiny room contained three other beds because Anne had to share her bedroom.
After the war, Otto Frank, the only surviving member of the family, prevented the house from demolition. He wanted it to be –Neither a museum nor a place of pilgrimage but an earnest warning from the past and a mission of hope for the future.
The Anne Frank House is located at Prinsengracht 263 (map). Opening opening hours mid March – mid September daily, 9 am-9 pm, Saturdays until 11pm; July and August 9 am-9 pm; mid September –mid March 9 am – 7 pm. Admission fee, €8.50, buy tickets online and avoid queueing.
If you can’t visit Anne Frank House in person, take a 3D Secret Annex virtual tour showing what everyday life was like for the family in hiding. During the online experience you listen to fragments taken from Anne’s diary and eye witness accounts from the Anne Frank Foundation archives, telling the story of life in the annex.
QUIRKY BOUTIQUES AND INFORMAL EATERIES
A few minutes’ walk from Anne Frank House is the Nine Streets. Quirky fashion boutiques and gift shops rub shoulder with antique shops and second-hand clothing stores. Throw in a handful romantic and down-to-earth places to eat and you have a shopping experience to die for.
Be sure to stop in at Lady Day (Hartenstraat 9) and try on a trendy coat with a matching hat. If you like board games The Gamekeeper (Hartenstraat 14) is your place. Kramer-Pontifex (Reestraat 20) seller of fragrant oils and candles oozes atmosphere. You’ll come upon all sorts of ribbons, tassels and cord at old fashioned haberdashery Van de Kerkhof (Wolvenstraat 9), but no buttons. Around the corner to Herengracht 389. De Knopenwinkel, a shop selling buttons you never imagined. Be seduced by colorful second-hand clothes at Laura Dols (Wolvenstraat 6). Rummage through the bargain bins at Zipper (Huidenstraat 7) and find that fifties dress with a belt to match. Stock up on cheese, wine and olives in De Kaaskamer (Runstraat 9) or buy that leather jacket from Robin and Rick (Runstraat 30). Find that old fashioned tooth paste or your favorite brand at The White Teeth Shop (Runstraat 5), and a toothbrush that fits your mood.
Shopping makes for hunger. Grab a quick coffee and a sandwich at Bertram & Bread (Reestraat 15). Indulge in tempting handmade chocolates at Pompadour Chocolaterie (Huidenstraat 12). Pop in at Koffiehuis De Hoek (Prinsengracht 341) for a wedge of scrumptious apple pie.
Nine Little Streets shopping lanes is close to the Westerkerk. The area is bounded by Reestraat, Hartenstraat and Gasthuismolensteeg to the north and Runstraat en Huidenstraat to the south and intersected by Prinsengracht, Keizersgracht and Herengracht. Shopping hours 11 am-5 pm, closed on Sunday.
Quirky Boutiques
ENDING YOUR DAY
The best way to end your day is to hop on the Stop/Go minibus for a do-it-yourself mini tour of Amsterdam city center. Rest your weary feet while the bus manoeuvers along narrow Prinsengracht, negotiating sharp corners and humpback bridges. Plenty of interesting sights en route – bridges festooned with bicycles, seventeenth-century gables complete with hook and pulley and red-shuttered warehouses that look like a child’s advent calendar.
The Stop/Go bus offers only three permanent stops: Amsterdam Centraal Station, Public Library at Oosterdok and Muziektheater near Waterlooplein. If you see something interesting, jump off (after you have asked the driver to halt). Your €1 ticket is valid for one hour and you buy it from the driver. Buses run daily from 9 am to 5.30 pm, every 12 minutes.
Photo credits: Marianne Crone
