I'm off to Amsterdam tomorrow - anyone got any suggestions for things to do, certain places to check out, places to avoid, etc etc?

...enjoy??

I find the Smartshops quite coool
You'll find one on almost everyone corner haha

The best advice i can give: Amsterdam is a city build for pedestrians. Don´t take the subway, tram or bus and don´t be afraid to get lost. It´s not a big city so you´ll always find your way back.

Dont get lured into the coffeeshops near central station, go further away, and it will be more pleasant and cheaper. De Pijp is a kinda hipster-ish but cool area of town, has a couple good coffee shops, like Katsu.

Enjoy your stay, sit in parks in the sun if its good weather!

Barney's was my favorite coffeeshop! Amsterdam has more museums per square mile than anywhere else on the planet, so if you like art you are in heaven. Cannabis College is worthy stop. Helpfully located near coffeeshops are the patisseries with awesome baked apples! Also, eating a big hunk of space cake just before flying back is helpful.

I agree! g-13 haze my first true love

Only just read these replies and we are on our last day of the 'Dam. We made our own way around and had a great time, we were camping outside of this city and it was bliss seeing so many happy tokers around the place. We found a couple of great coffee shops and tried some different strains (Dr Grinspoon and a Blueberry one) which was a nice change to not knowing what I would be getting.

We checked out a great museum/personal collection dedicated to cats which was fun. Unfortunately for us both, we have been pretty fluey since arriving, so we felt pretty run down most of the time. Great city though, will definitely be back! We are off to Denmark next, and we have a big overnight train ahead of us - spacecake sounds like a good idea, just need to find a place that makes a vegan one!

I don´t know of any vegan coffeeshop in amsterdam. I´m sure though, that at kokopelli (warmoesstraat 12) you´ll be able to find something for on the train. It´s a nice place. I sometimes just go there for a cup of tea.

I would also recommend trying some indonesian or surinamese food, because it´s probably the first time you would eat indonesian or surinamese stuff and it´s realy different than chinese, indian or thai food. 'Blauw' (amstelveenseweg 15 is a restaurant that has great indonesian food, but there are many good indonesian restaurants in amsterdam.

The best restaurant in amsterdam by far, is 'le ciel blue' on the highest floor of the okura, (you can see it from practically anywhere) but that place is realy VERY expensive. Way beyond a backpackers budget. Both the food and the view are absolutely unrivaled though.

If you have some time left, you could go floating at koan-float (herengracht 321) for half an hour or an hour.

Really? I know of one even in my hick southern USA town...

Though of course they sell coffee and not cannabis !

Amsterdam is great although when I went I was only 11 so I didnt get the full experience.
I returned home with some amazing pieces but I had lost/sold most of them by the time I started smoking cannabis
Anyway have fun !

Didn't get around to finding any vegan space cake - guess I'll just have to make my own! On the topic of cannabis-food, might try making some majoun when I get a chance - or a least my own interpretation of it.

I'll definately be back to Amsterdam one day, really regret not getting around to trying G-13 Haze but we had a great time regardless.

As for Indonesian food, I have tried Nasi Goreng before but that's all I think - does the Nederlands in particular have a large Indonesian population?

Btw Polytrip, did you see my post about Santorini?

Indonesia was once a part of the netherlands like india once was a part of britain. Especially the vegetarian food is often realy special, because they use combinations of flavours that are very unusual (like coconut, turmeric, koriander, aniseed, cardamom, union, garlic and chillipepper).

And yes, i saw the beautiful pictures you made of santorini. You realy managed to catch the atmosphere of the place.