I confess.  I am a bonefide snob.  A travel snob.

A corporate client recently chose a major European city for his incentive program.  I’d given him Cuba … where I had secured the two finest hotels in the country … and yet he chose a major European city instead.

Are you kidding me?

I was incredulous at his decision.  Even a little miffed.  After all, I am the proponent of off-the-beaten-path travel …. always in search of new places and novel experiences.  How am I supposed to get excited about Amsterdam?

Well . . . consider me humbled.

I arrived here in Amsterdam on Monday, fitting in a 5-day site inspection into my already busy travel schedule.  I’d been here before – many, many years ago – on a “fam” (familiarization) trip hosted by the government tourist bureau.  It was nice, but I wasn’t “wowed” back then.  But I gotta say, I have been impressed and astonished by what I’ve discovered in these busy few days.

Even the “creative queen” can learn a thing or two and have all her assumptions busted!  I do love when that happens!

Here’s what I’m loving about this new (old) destination!

• There’s a creative vibrancy here that I’ve not experienced anywhere else.  The public art and architecture is wild and whimsical.  Fresh and forward-thinking.
• The progressiveness is evident in their policy about marijuana and prostitution.  Both are legal, controlled and taxed.  (The industry generates about €650 million in tax revenue!)  It’s interesting, intriguing and challenging to our puritanical American thinking – that these vices (which are a fact of life) are so open.  It’s logical.  It works.  Cannabis ice cream? – you can get it here.  The RLD (Red Light District) is not sordid, seedy or unsafe.  I’m sure there’s an underbelly that I don’t see … and it distresses me to see young women in scanty panties, illuminated by red neon lights, tempting customers to join them in their little cubicles.  It seems to me to be a horrible career choice – if, indeed, it is a choice.  But this system regulates and monitors working practices and standards, and ensures that that all prostitutes have access to medical care.  It’s certainly a novel idea and challenges all assumptions – which is one of the best things about the experience of traveling – right?
  

  Amsterdam Vice – it’s not for everyone … but fascinating, all the same.

• For a European capital city, there is virtually NO traffic!  Talk about a great quality of life!  It’s unbelievable.  Everybody is on bicycles or riding public transportation.  It can be dangerous to be a pedestrian … the bikes are hard to hear – and (although I’m sure there’s an orderliness to the flow) they seem to come at you from everywhere.  Word of warning: do not walk on the red “sidewalks” – they are the bike paths.
  • I met a woman who told me she got her driver’s license 15 years ago and hasn’t driven a car in 14 years.
  • They don’t honk horns here.
  • It’s a 15-minute train ride from Amsterdam’s Central Station (one of the most beautiful buildings in town) to the airport and costs only €4.
• Not a gypsy in sight.  Not a begger or panhandler, which are so prevalent and annoying in Florence and Barcelona and Paris.  Graffiti is much less evident than most other places in Europe.
  

  Clean, friendly and beautiful Amsterdam – especially in the sunshine!

•  Restaurants are amazing.  Ancient ones, contemporary ones and everything in between:
  • Jamie Oliver’s Fifteen is a novel social enterprise model: he hires 15 unemployed young people and trains them in the restaurant business.
  • d’Vijf Vlieghen (easy for you to say!), or Five Flies, began as a restaurant in 1939 when the owner of an antique store decided to serve food and wine.  It is situated in atmospheric rooms of 17th-century canal houses, dripping with antiques and eye candy – including four original Rembrandt etchings.
    

    The dining scene ranges from the ancient to innovative contemporary restaurants.

• Electric cars are not a novelty:
  • Teslas are taxis here.  Really!  In a bid to reduce its carbon footprint, the airport launched taxi service with nearly 200 Tesla Model S taxis.
  • Car2Go is an innovative, flexible car rental option.  Sign up with the app, and you can jump in any one of hundreds of electric Smart cars wherever you find one parked (locate the closest one with your smart phone), drive it for as long as you like (pay by the minute, hour or day), and simply leave it wherever you happen to be when you’re done. Parking is easy with these tiny cars, and parking is free.  Lots of charging stations all over town, too.  Wouldn’t work in L.A., but what a brilliant, innovative idea!
• And did I mention how stunningly beautiful is Amsterdam?  Ancient merchant houses tilt at off angles, reflected in the inky black canals.  The world-famous Rijksmuseum is a gorgeous masterpiece, even without the Rembrandts and Van Goghs and Vermeers.

… and don’t get me started on Bruges … a “day-tripper, tourist trap” which can be an extraordinary tourist-free experience, if you do it right!  (Next week, I’ll give you some ideas how to do that!)

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Comments?  What’s your favorite on-the-beaten-path place?