Date: 6. October 2021
Author: Marlon, Julian
Position: Den Helder Harbour
Geographical Position: 52°57.N , 004°47.E
Etmal: 0 NM (total: 346 NM)

The day started at 8:00 o‘clock when we had the meeting with Jamie. She explained to us what we will do that day and reminded us about the rules for shore leave and immediately after that meeting we got ready for leaving the vessel.

At 08:30 we left the ship and 20 minutes later we arrived at the train station and got our tickets from Kristina. After 1 hour and 17 minutes of traveling we arrived in the city of Amsterdam.

We counted off and after that Kristina told us what the schedule for this day would be. Then we split into groups and started going to the different museums.

One group went to the ship museum, the other went to the Rijksmuseum, the third group went to the Rembrandt museum and the fourth and last group went to the Van Gogh museum.

There we had a few tasks to fulfill like a selfie with an art picture from one of the museums and another picture that represents Amsterdam typically.

This was kind of a competition where the best pictures could win prizes.

The ship museum was quite interesting because there where different models of boats and we learned a lot about the history of sailing ships.

The Van Gogh museum was also very nice because you learned a lot about the painter‘s personality and the pictures represented his impressions and also his lifestyle. Amsterdam as a city was also quite cool, we saw a lot of markets for flowers and typical cheese.

And of course all the canals and bridges with a lot of boats throughout the city were really pretty. In the afternoon all the groups went to different shops to buy souvenirs and typically dutch food.

Our trip to Amsterdam ended at 17:15 at the train station of Amsterdam were we all met. Tired but happy we arrived at Den Helder again and after a short walk for about 15 minutes we were back at the vessel in the harbour at 7:00 pm.