Amsterdam

Walk the canals where the world's richest merchants plotted global trade empires. See the Golden Bend mansions, the skinny bridge at twilight, and the square where Rembrandt's Night Watch comes to life in bronze.

Hidden courtyards, a diary that changed the world, and a church tower Anne Frank could hear but never see. The Jordaan's flower-named streets hold stories of refuge, resistance, and reinvention.

From Rembrandt's masterwork to Van Gogh's sunflowers, then out to the multicultural streets where the city's best stroopwafels are made fresh on a griddle. Art and appetite in perfect balance.