Amsterdam was one of my least favorite cities of the trip. The trip was amazing, so that's like saying freshwater pearls are my least favorite pearl. I'm not a city girl. I like the country and very small towns. In Amsterdam, I thought I was going to be run over all the time. I've never seen so many bicycles in my life, and they stop for no one. Imagine the most bikes you've ever seen in one place and multiply it by 10,000. I'm not exaggerating.
On the plus side, the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam was amazing. I made sure we bought tickets the night before and got there right when it opened, and then rushed upstairs to see the Rembrandt paintings right away. We had them to ourselves and my sister wanted to know why I rushed. 15 minutes later the hoard arrived and you couldn't get withing viewing distance of the Rembrandts, because it was so packed with people. Sister said, "OH, now I get it. Thanks." We only made it halfway through the museum before getting tired. We actually had famous painting overload.
For a while I was taking photos of any painting which showed someone wearing natural pearls. Then there were just too many. I'll have to dig through my photos and post some.