04-28 Dutch Resistance Museum

This morning we are walking to the Dutch Resistance Museum. It's east of us - a new side of town. After an introductory movie we get our audio guide and at 1:15pm we still aren't finished, so we get some lunch at their cafe next door. Very thin white bread toasted cheese and ham for Karen (it was good, enjoyed it) and Pat had a steak sandwich.

This is another thorough museum. It covers the occupation from several different angles. Jews, resistance people, people who just got along and people who supported the Nazi's. Each group thought what they were doing was right. The audio tour with this was again excellent and in English and so were the picture captions on the wall (although I needed 20 year old eyes to see some of them)

There were so many stories. It gave you a real sense of what happened here after the bombing of Rotterdam. The Queen and her family and cabinet fled to London to lead and encourage the resistance and to support the Allies. From there she did a radio broadcast. When the Germans found out, they made the people turn in their radios. So people made crystal radios, some as small as a matchbox. Examples of these radios were here for you to see.

Children who visited the museum had a separate section that followed four kids. One Jewish child, one whose parent helped with the resistance, one who's parent joined the NSB helping the Nazi's (by turning in their neighbors) and one child’s family just tried to get along. You went into each of their houses and heard and saw what their life was like; how their lives changed. Their hiding places, the games they play to learn what to do during a bombing, hiding family members in the house somewhere because the Germans wanted to send the young men to Germany to work to help their war effort.

This is a very excellent museum. To cover it all you need almost a full day. We spent 5 hours in the museum and a half an hour at lunch.

Next was a walk over by the Anne Frank House to visit the Tulip Museum. It told the story of how tulips came from Turkey in the late 1400's and are named tulips because they looked like turbans. Carolus Clusius wrote the book that made them so popular. They even had a Tulip Crash after speculators ran up the price of tulips. This museum was small with an introductory video in English, then a walk-through area where you read things. Including the gift shop we were there one hour.

Great map of where tulips came from.

Next door to the Anne Frank House is a great pancake place. It was on our to-do list when we visited the Frank House, but that visit got switched to 7pm one day and so we have time to eat there today. Karen had banana, almond, and chocolate sauce. It was delicious. Pat had bacon and almonds and it was delicious as well. This place is very highly rated. There are several more flavor combinations I would love to try. We'll go back.

We walked to the grocery for water and cereal. Then home to enjoy our view. We are really enjoying our view and all the boats, bikes, and walking activity near our place. Tonight three swans flew in and landed in our canal. Today it didn't rain all day. ❤️ Amsterdam is looking better and better every day. Sunday it is supposed to break 60.