One of many colorful boats floating down the Amstel River during the Gay Pride Weekend

Of all the major events in Amsterdam, only the UitMarkt and Queen’s Day draw bigger crowds. The Canal Parade is the weekend’s highlight with a flotilla of boats crusing the canals of Amsterdam’s Centrum.

The Prinsengracht or the Amstel are both great places to see all the boats as they pass – but if you expect to see anything from the edge of a canal or a bridge rail, you’d better stake out your territory earlier in the day for a really choice location. Last year over 250,000 people turned out for the parade! My last visit to the parade left me hopping up and down trying to see over the heads of rows and rows of the very tall Dutch people in front of me.

But wait! There’s a lot more to it than just a bizarre floating parade with bands, divas, dancing boys and girls! Also planned are: An Open Air Film festival on the Nieuwmarkt, “The Club Beautiful” in the Theater COC Amsterdam, Musical concerts, Religious services, Art exhibits, The sQueeze Picnic, and a Fundraiser for Aidsfonds. They have a website with a lot more info. So get there early and have fun, you’ll never be the same after doing Gay Pride!

Amsterdam’s Chinatown has exploded in the past few years. It’s gone beyond it’s confines in the Red Light District and is now spilling over past the Nieuwmarkt. To call it “Chinatown” is a misnomer of course, because the area include numerous Thai, Indonesian, Malaysian restaurants, shops, salons, apothecaries, markets and more.

A transformation in a good part of the Red Light District has occured thanks to the success of the many restaurants in the area, and the introduction of new ones. Add to this the reconstruction of many façades, and the repaving of the streets, and this district has been metamorphized from seedy to inviting. The hordes of hungry tourists in the area can attest to this.

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Staying out late and getting drunk with friends is perhaps the most popular sport in Holland. Yes, far more Dutch people get drunk than use other drugs! Brown pubs are everywhere and serve as the center of social life for many Dutch people. These cozy, smokey bars have a lot of charm and are a great way to mingle with the locals.

If you’re a beer fan, you’ve come to the right city to indulge yourself. Amsterdam is the home of several great beers including the world’s #2 seller, Heineken. And their old brewery is one of the best places to get sloshed as they let you drink all you can in half an hour at the end of the tour. It’s probably just as well that they limit you since more time would result in some serious complications, no?

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So you’ve heard that the Dutch are tolerant towards the recreational use of soft drugs. Now you want to find out more about the Dutch Coffeeshop Scene. Well you can take a look at our Coffeeshop Reviews and find that cool place with the right combination of music, ambiance and of course great smoke. But you might also want to read our Cannabis Smoking Tipswhich warn you about the effects and offer suggestions should you do too much.

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The Cannabis College, on the Oudezijdes Achterburghwal, in Amsterdam’s Red Light District, is a clearing house and archive of accurate cannabis related information. Focusing on the thousands of uses of cannabis (besides recreation), the volunteers here are extremely knowledgeable about all aspects of this amazing plant. There are displays with hundreds of samples of cannabis related products including clothes, cosmetics, food, and much more. There are two electronically controlled vaporizers for you to try this healthier method of cannabis ingestion.

Downstairs there’s a working indoor marijuana garden, complete with growers on hand to answer your growing related questions. There is a €2.50 donation to view the garden, otherwise the rest of the College is free to browse. We encourage all who visit to donate something to this worthy cause.

What a cool way to spend a day, zipping through Amsterdam at another pace, in another dimension from the foot traffic (of which there is a lot)! Amsterdam is blessed with bike lanes everywhere, with their own traffic lights and signage (in Dutch), alongside the car and tram lanes. Usually it’s much quicker to ride your bike through town than any other way of transportation. Renting a bike is easy, at Central Station or from the many places in town that rent bikes privately. Just lock it up tight and pray, bikes are stolen with amazing speed in Amsterdam!

These friendly, “Gezellig” pubs are warm, comfortable meeting and drinking places for the Dutch, and their visitors. The center of the local Dutch scene, be prepared to down some jenever (gin) and a lot of beer. If you’re lucky a little snack as well. They say they are called “brown” because of the walls being stained by centuries of tobacco smoke wafting through the air. They are “gezellig” because that’s the Dutch word for cozy or comfortable.

For a refreshingly different view of Amsterdam, try a canal boat tour. The canals provide a leisurely pace from which to observe Amsterdam’s unique architecture and street life.

You can find a convenient departure either in the daytime or evening hours from many locations throughout the city. There are even canal boat taxis that can take you directly to your destination. You’ll notice numerous tour operators near Central Station and along the Damrak downtown. There are some good bargains to be found if you shop around.

A fun way to spend explore Amsterdam is to purchase a day ticket, get on and off at different stops to walk around or see a museum then get back on another boat from the same company later, to another destination. Don’t forget the camera!