Vondelpark Openluchttheater

You like Central Park in NYC? Nothing compared to Vondelpark! Me and my best friend just decided to go get lost in the park one day. We stopped by a market and brought a picnic. There was a bunch of people just sitting on the ground doing the same. The weather was perfect! We eventually just walked and walked around all googly eyed at how beautiful everything was.

Alors là je valide ce parc à 99%.
Pourquoi 99%? À cause des vélos qui de temps en temps né sont pas loin de vous écraser…
Mais sinon la balade dans le parc est très agréable. On y voit des canards dans l’eau, des fontaines et le grand nombre de bancs permet de papoter, d’observer les gens qui courent, marchent, pédalent… Ça donne un peu l’impression de faire partie de la ville.
J’y suis allée trois fois en quatre jours, c’est dire si je l’ai apprécié ce parc.
Le coucher de soleil sur la fontaine était magnifique.

Vondelpark is a fairly goodsized park located in Amsterdam. It’s got tennis courts, two restaurants, kids spaces, walking trails, cycling paths, an open air music theatre and a gazebo. It’s a good ride, walk or run around the walkways of the park. There are many places to sit in the grass and take in the sunshine as well as places to picnic or have a barbeque. It’s a great people space usually filled with just that, people.

Nothing like a lazy day in Vondelpark. Once I was laying in the park and doing some hard relaxing when I realized I should have brought some beer. Now I could have gotten up and rode my bike to the nearest store… but that would have involved getting up. So I sat there for a while and soon enough some guy came walking around selling ice cold beer. What was nice is the fact that I’ve had a lot of problems finding COLD beer to go anywhere in Amsterdam. Beer is usually sold piss warm in the grocery store. I paid 2 Euro per beer and bought 3 of them. I drank them all while they were still cold then fell asleep for a hour or 2. (I later went to the store and found that the beer I bought was .50 Euro each… BUT WARM… It was worth the extra 1.50 per to have an ice cold one at my convenience) Otherwise the park is great for a nice bike ride or to just lay around and people watch. Outside the park you can find a couple traditional fish stands… this is where people eat whole cured herrings with raw onion as a snack… it really gets your breath right. I’ve never been to one of the free concerts in the park, but I bet its awesome. I hope to someday return again.

The Vondelpark open air theatre is really great. It is a fun way to spend a Sunday afternoon listening to live music out in sunshine. On Saturday evenings there is often (dutch) comedy. I went there yesterday to see a friends band play and it was very nice.
You can get your drinks and food at the bar ‘Vondeling’ which is located in front of the theatre.

This is Dutch culture at it’s best. During the summer months the open air theater holds free concerts for the public. Friday nights has modern dance, Saturday nights has world music, and Sunday is singer songwriter day. I showed up for singer songwriter day on a beautiful Sunday afternoon. There were probably a dozen acts throughout the day, all of them singing songs in English and Dutch. The crowd was small and intimate in the beginning, but as the show progressed the crowd grew thicker and thicker until it was a full fledged concert with standing room only. People of all ages: families, young hipsters and older couples alike seemed to all be equally represented in the crowd. The Dutch appreciate culture in and of itself, regardless if it’s a genre that they can readily identify with or not, giving credit to their open-​minded reputation. Its hard to imagine a venue in America that would hold the attention of such a diverese audience for hours on end, but the Dutch seem to do it. The open air theater is a must see for tourists, especially travelers on a budget, hours of entertainment for free! Before or after the show you can venture through Vondelpark and have a picnic, which is another must-​do for any Amsterdam sojourner.