The end of our tour, almost.   Our final excursion is "Amsterdam, City of Diamonds" with Airport Transfer.

Amsterdam is the city of canals and bridges, full of special charm. During a short canal cruise, discover the many mansions and buildings dating from the “Golden Century” when merchants traded with the Far East. The Amstel River flows through Amsterdam. On its northern bank is the former Jewish area where diamond traders and cutters produced the most beautiful stones. See this process at work in the Gassan factory, restored to its former glory days when Amsterdam was the biggest trading centre for diamonds in northern Europe. Then complete your tour with a transfer to Amsterdam’s airport in time for your flight. Notes: This option is available only to guests with flights departing after 2:00pm.

Breakfast was a sorry affair; the last time for a long while that we can have a cooked breakfast without having to cook it ourselves, the last time we shall be served by our waiters that we have become friends with.   This really brings it home to us, that the holiday is almost over.

Disembarkation wasn't the slick operation it was meant to be.   HAL were trying a new system and had given us all times to leave our cabins and proceed to the gangway.   Unfortunately the port had a hitch of some sort and departure was delayed.   HAL had not forseen this, and instead of people arriving at the gangway at (original time + delay time) everyone was arriving at the original scheduled time.   This resulted in a huge congregation around the stairwells and corridors leading to the gangway.   Once we started offloading this gradually became less of a problem.   The next holdup was luggage reclaim.   The idea was that the luggage should come off in the same order as the passengers, but a huge crowd of us gathered in front of a sea of luggage that no one was claiming.   When ours finally came out, and I was finding mine, I noticed that the latest people clearing customs were going to the earlier luggage.   I think the local porters must have unloaded it in reverse order.   Oh well we were finally on our coach with our luggage, everyone present and off we went, a full 500 yards just round the corner to where our canal craft was.   Here our coach blocked the port exit while we all got off for the boat.   It seems to me that Amsterdam have a long way to go in learning how to run a cruise terminal.   We might have been better off with the tent in the container terminal after all, though it might have been worse.

The weather was kind to us again, a lovely sunny day, just right for our canal tour of Amsterdam.  We started in the harbour and then entered the canals.   I was surprised that we didn't have to go through a lock, but then realised we must have come through a lock in the Prinsendam to enter the port.   We had a running commentary on the architecture, the people who lived there, the history and culture for all the places we passed.   We were glad not to be going to Anne Frank's house when we saw the queues there.   I had been navigating in my head where we had been, so I could retrace it on the map later, but we turned so many times and went between the three concentric rings of canals more times than I could keep track of.   We ended up at a landing stage for the diamond house, where we left the boat and met the Gassan guide for our tour.

There was less security palaver here than the nonsense we have to go through at airports, though there were security cameras every where.   We had a brief talk on the company and history, then a look at the museum exhibits and also a diamond cutter at work.   We then assembled in a lecture room where the guide sat at a desk and gave an illustrated talk on diamonds and the various cuts, showing several diamonds ranging in value from several hundreds to several thousands of Euros, none that I could afford.   We ended up at the shop where we could buy, and finally the coffee shop where our coach was waiting for us.

Having had a tour all round Amsterdam by boat we now had one by coach.   This was not so easy as there was a lot more traffic on the roads than on the canals.   At one point the coach stopped so that those that wanted to, could take a walk around the street markets with the guide.   Some of us stayed aboard the coach and had an extra tour of the city narrated by the driver.   After about 20 minutes we all met up again and made for the airport where we dropped off at our appropriate buildings according to where we going.

We then just have to wait for our evening flight   We had planned to put our luggage in lockers and then go off to a restaurant to while away the time, but in the end we just settled down where it was nice and cool, and waited it out, even though there were 5 hours still to go.   We had the occasional sandwich or drink from a fast food place, but we spent quite a lot of time watching people struggle with the moving walkway escalator.   The trolleys at Schippol are a bit tricky at first, as they wont move until you release the brake by squeezing two handles together.   Once you have discovered this, it is second nature to just keep them squeezed together as you make your way around   When you get to the moving walkway escalator something says to you, "this might be dangerous, lets use the lift"   The foolhardy, or the brave, just go straight on with their laden luggage trolley.   Once they are well up on the slope, with several heavy suitcases, gravity takes over and the trolley wants to roll back down the slope.   Stopping the trolley doing this, even for a big burly rugger type, is quite a demanding task; and most don't succeed.   Usually the trolley spins sideways, wedging itself against the sides and all the cases tumble off.   Once the trolley is relieved of its weight, it no longer wants to come back down, but is happy to be taken to the top, along with the suitcases.   Now I just wish I'd thought to take a picture of all this; and the multi-lingual sign, with pictures, at the bottom warning people to engage the brake by letting go of the handle.   Finally it was time to board our Easyjet back to Stanstead, (the volcano was willing).  We had paid the extra for priority boarding and as it wasn't much we were glad we did.   There were four of us who got on first, then those with kids or crutches, before the others were allowed on.   For a budget Airline we were quite impressed with Easy Jet, just as good as BA economy, though not as good as Virgin.

Captain Albert's Blog: Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

Although we left the cruise in Amsterdam to fly home, some stayed on for the back-to-back option of the Baltic cruise.   This made it a 36 day cruise which some might consider a little bit long, but it does get you back to Tilbury where this cruise started.   It seems that many cruise lines are cottoning on to the fact that quite a few of us are fed up with all the hassle of flying (it used to be enjoyable, and exciting), so they now offer port-to-same port options by some clever programming.   Anyway, if you were following Captain Albert's blogs, the ones for the Baltic segment are linked from here.