My French son and friends when teens also made pilgrimages to Amsterdam and rarely got out of coffeeshops sad to say. These are the types of tourist who spend little besides on cannabis - they even slept in cars sometimes.

Well, the reason for that is pretty simple to explain.
When you live(d) in Cologne, Paris or Brussels, Amsterdam is not one far-away foreign destination but just a few hours on the train.
It was neither costly nor a once-every-five-years trip to Europe.
If youngsters went to A'dam for the coffeeshops and only to smoke joints, parents were HAPPY in the 1980s... that was age of heroin and other really evil stuff. By the way, in those years, cannabis was usually less potent than these days.. so the effects were much milder and closer to getting a bit tipsy...
After the fall of the iron curtain, harder drugs became much more mainstream when the designer drug kitchens in Czech and the Baltics started to flood Western Europe.. now THAT were some wild times. And seriously much more dangerous than the weed in those good ole coffeeshops.

DOG DOO INCIDENT

One thing I remember vividly from the 80s was that dog leavings were rife on public sidewalks - much more so than in later years IME.

And one memorable incident:

I was walking and looking up and not down and stepped in a big stack of freshly laid dog poop. So I started walking away whilst trying to get it off my shoes by scraping on the blocks that made up the sidewalk. What else could I do? But out barges the owner of a shop and starts screaming at me - 'telling me I was getting it all over' - here I was the culprit when really the dog's owner who let the mut shit there was the culprit. I got furious and screamed back at the bloke something about not being my fault, etc.

Not sure what I should have done - taken off my shoe and walked shoeless to some other place?

But dog poop was a real problem then and it was everywhere!

BACK TO THE FLYING DUTCHMAN...

There were two places we knew that sold acid in Amsterdam - the Flying Dutchman and The Other Place - that Hell's Angels' owned bar in the red-light district (now a coffeeshop selling cannabis - Hells Angels gone it seems as part of Amsterdam's efforts to clean up the red-light district).But the nutcase with wild eyes that ran that place was just too erratic to deal with. And, the Dutchman always had some and the dealer there was so nice.

First you'd ask the tall red-haired tough-looking Dutch guy who ran the place (seems his father may have owned it) and he'd say to go down to the lower level where a dealer would appear with sheets of hundreds of hits of blotter acid that he would cut off how much you wanted. It was all rather quite open though discrete enough that no one really saw what was going on. And even though I saw off-duty Amsterdam cops sitting at the bar, obviously there was little enforcement of laws against that type of drug dealing.

This anything goes attitude typified Amsterdam in the 80s and 90s IME. For instance there was a heroin boat moored near the front of Centraal Station that I observed a never-ending string of folks coming and going - they could buy heroin there and shoot up, etc- kind of like places we now see in some enlightened places. And, as mentioned elsewhere probably there was also a heroin place on top of a police station by Amstel Station that I saw so there must have been quite a few. Just like places selling acid no doubt - Amsterdam was an anything goes city in the 80s and 90s.

And scoring acid at the Dutchman was always easy and fun and the pub was so so great to be in after a day of incessantly walking around the town. It was also where I encountered Gulpen beer for the first time - not sure how but Terry or Teddy, the short portly main bar tender who was right from Manchester, may have suggested it and for years I always told him 'Gulpen please! Gulpener beer was and probably is a stronger beer than the Heinie they had on tap and a bit dark - a beer with a taste.

The tall rough-looking Dutch guy who ran the bar sold it somehow sold it to this Terry and moved to Portugal where he ran some kind of bar or hotel. I recall him lamenting once to me that 'I'm still here after all those drugs and all that booze!' just before he sold the pub.

Oh one funny thing - I saw a scraggly old man come into the Dutchman with a rolled up newspaper and the owner opened it up and there were several sheets of hundreds of hits of acid inside. Who would have known out on the street that this old homeless looking guy was transporting tons of acid on him.

Ah the Dutchman will also evoke great memories in my mind. After Terry took over the place I asked as usual for acid and he said they didn't do that anymore since the enforcement of drugs laws was getting tougher; even pot smoking was frowned upon as I found out one day when I lit up and Terry said 'put that out please'. I finished my Gulpen and never returned though I would look into the bar from time to time and there were new owners and no pot smoking and a bit more upscale - just a regular pub though still a bit grungy like the old Dutchman.

Can you stop gong on about the flying dutchman! No wonder your memories of Amsterdam are so hazy.

menachem: Oh, let him post -- he has this need to keep topping his reminiscences. (Between his own 35 post and your 25 it seems no one else is playing ;) )

It's so weird, I moved to Amsterdam in 1989. Reading his posts is like looking into a distorted mirror.

Gives whole new meaning to "trip report."

menachem - please stop reading this if it makes you upset.

menachem: Oh, let him post -- he has this need to keep topping his reminiscences. (Between his own 35 post and your 25 it seems no one else is playing>

3.8 K have read or posted and Google reports over 12,000 hits. Why just come to insult?

PQ. a tip for you.
You have recently stated on me, now you are biting at menahem. Maybe time to take a short break?
Can I respectfully ask that you get to know how to quote another post. Just recently your seem to have not ben able to do that.

Well a trip report of this type is a personal thing and though I welcome folks who have experiences on 80s and 90s to chime in - criticisms from the usual folks and advice on what I should dwell on or not in this type of post is not in order; seems. So let's get on with the post of Amsterdam in 80s and 90s OMG and yes this is highlighting the OMG part.

COFFEESHOPS

When I first started going to Amsterdam in 1969 there were no coffeeshops (places selling cannabis products from posted menu over the counter and folks could smoke inside). It was around 1978 or so that we caught wind of the Bulldog - often said to be the first coffeeshop in Amsterdam though I've heard Mellow Yellow and Rusland's may contest that honor. Anyway we of course tracked down the original Bulldog, on O.Z Voorburgwal in the red-light district. It was a tiny place with a typical bar on the ground floor and the house cannabis dealer downstairs. Hash then was the only cannabis sold and the Dutch loved to make huge spliffs with their strong pouch tobacco and hash. Marihuana came in about a decade later, probably to serve the burgeoning number of Americans who came to Amsterdam then primarily because of the coffeeshops. The Cannabis Cup each November brough many Yanks to Amsterdam.

Anyway, the old Bulldog was a busy place with many just coming in to buy as the upper bar place had few seats. An older gray-haired guy owned the place which he named after his dog - a rather plump bulldog which was often in the place. The old Bulldog is still there but he Bulldog Empire has spread over Amsterdam with the most noticeable emporium the Bulldog Palace on the Leidesplein which was designed like a large American sports bar with large screens for sporting events - it was and presumably is a very posh looking place - again the dealer is downstairs and upstairs the mainly American college looking folks would smoke there.

Within a few years of the original three coffeeshops opening more and more opened up and became literally in the several hundreds at one time before the City of Amsterdam began a policy of not renewing shop permits to reduce the number I read to a few hundred. One policy was that if the original owner sold the place the permit would cease being in effect. Many coffeeshops were in the Red-Light district - some 80 in a very small area but now reduced to about 25 I read.

The coffeeshops in the centrum were often oriented to tourists and often had higher prices or lesser quality. I enjoyed seeking out shops in the outer areas and these were very different in clientele with folks literally of all ages coming in and out. I fondly remember one incident in a shop now long gone - a young couple were inside with a young toddler (yes not good with second-hand smoke of tobacco and cannabis) and the shop's dog came up while they were changing the baby's diary and snatched the diaper and ran out into the street - finally being enticed back in with it.

Actually there was one place that sold hash before we knew about the Bulldog - the Melkweg or Milky Way, a city-owned 'youth center' in a unique old building just off the Leidesplein where in the upper floor tea shop there was a dealer with just one type of hash. The nearby Paradisio, another youth center, in an old church upon whose top was put a big fluorescent cross that tilted back and forth. Both places were known for their concerts - the Paradisio was just a concert hall and folks puffed away on spliffs at will. Oddly enough, the Melkweg was right opposite a major Amsterdam police station.

SO NEXT UP THE MILKY WAY AND PARADISIO AND OTHER YOUTH MUSIC VENUES

Pal: Yes, thousands have opened the thread but apparently most moved on because there are a mere 90 comments in 9 months. And most of those (80% ) are either you topping it over and over, or menachem and ribeiasacra clarifying/correcting things. Not insulting you, but really, 30+ year old reminiscences are not helping anyone traveling in this century.

janis - no one has to open this and if do and looking for current travel advice will leave yet others may be interested in what type of place Amsterdam was in those years - a time that gave Amsterdam its worldwide reputation as a wild anything goes place - much different than today. Maybe it should be in the Lounge but then others like those above gave their experiences of Amsterdam at that time could not see it as the Lounge has been closed for a long time to newcomers. Do you have any recollections of that period if you were there? Cheers!

Good grief, it's some sort of a trip report from 20 years ago. And clearly indentified as such.
What harm does it do if one or another story of one pub or coffeeshop was maybe somewhat blurred or not precise in retrospect.
Unless you had access to a time machine and were able to travel back to 1980s Amsterdam.
I doubt that anyone right in his or her mind would look at this thread for up-to-date help with his or her upcoming travels to the Netherlands.

Let an old man ramble and reminisce. He's doing no one any harm.
Amsterdam was the armpit of the world in the 70s and early 80s.

Actually I find it funny.

<doubt that anyone right in his or her mind would look at this thread for up-to-date help with his or her upcoming travels to the Netherlands.>

No, of course BUT it may peak a person's interest in some things covered - knowing their histories, etc. and maybe they will then want to visit such places as the Old Bulldog, Bulldog Palace, the Milky Way, Paradisio (all still going strong last I knew), etc.

For example someone posted this above:

<Thanks for posting the info about The Bulldog, PalenQ! I have no idea of the address of the one we went to. It was 1989 and I'm pretty sure it was in the red light district - that's all I know. I don't think I even have a photo - but would have to check. I do still have a t-shirt I bought there, though.

This is a very interesting thread.>

So things covered in this thread may well be of use to future Amsterdammer Tourists (?) and even some folks seem to find the thread interesting and the forum benefits from this as number of posts are seemingly dwindling by the day - so the more interesting to some posts helps abate that perhaps.

riebiascara - did I get the quote right? Please edify me - seriously about posting quotes! Cheers!

We arrived in Amsterdam on April 20th, 1984. KLM somehow had cancelled our three night hotel reservation, which we found out when we showed up after an overnight flight.

Easter weekend. No hotel. It still hurts.

https://www.thebulldog.com/

Official site of the Bulldog empire featuring, The Bulldog the Original at #90 O.Z, Oudezijds Voorburgwal 90 in the red-light district.

Says old Bulldog started in 1974 and asserts that the Bulldog was the first coffeeshop in Amsterdam. It says it started in the basement of a sex shop and that it was just at first a meeting place for locals to smoke some hash but shortly after tourists got wind of it (possibly quite literally!) and illegal sales began...says many police raids for first years - interesting history and a place that some future tourists' may want to visit - afterall it is one of the most (in) famous places in Amsterdam.

And the site says there are Bulldog Boat trips - probably ones where folks would feel free to light up and make a very different float thru Amsterdam (and yes more than a few visitors would be interested by that totally unique for Europe TMK experience.)And there are Bulldog hotels - several in Amsterdam where toking is no doubt allowed unlike many hotels - there are several around Europe too but I would not jump to any conclusions about toking in those.