Help with Amsterdam, Colmar, Paris trip
 

Hello, our daughter will be studying abroad in suburb Paris & will have 2 weeks break in April. We would like to visit her & do some travels with her.
We are thinking of flying from Washington DC to Amsterdam, stay for 2 days, 2 nights then visit Colmar, France, then go to Paris for a few days & fly back from Paris to DC.
Total trip is 8 days - counting arrival to Amsterdam.
We have been to Paris before.
What is the best transportation from Amsterdam to Colmar, France?
Suggested what to do, where to stay in Amsterdam for 2 days?
Thank you in advance.
We are a couple late 50, 60 - active, love to travel. Our daughter is 21.

Amsterdam and Colmar don't connect well. It is about 8 hours by train. Look it up yourself at www.bahn.com. If you fly, you can connect downtown to downtown in about 5 hours via Basel. You are chewing up a lot of time from your short trip. Do you really have "2 days" in Amsterdam? If you are flying UA or KLM direct IAD-AMS flights, you will be at your hotel in Amsterdam before lunch. Major museums start closing around 5pm, so depending on what you are interested in doing, you probably have 1.5 days presuming you are staying 2 nights. It is much easier for others to comment if you state how many nights you are staying at each stop.

Why Colmar? I'd choose destinations that connect more easily from Amsterdam.
Also I'd do Amsterdam - Paris, then "another French destination".

You allocate almost no time to Amsterdam, so why do you go there at all? Even if you've been to Paris "before", no way you've been able to scratch more than the surface a little. Go again, and longer. Plus you'll have you daughter as a guide. Why not let her guide you?

I agree - why Colmar?

And really, why Amsterdam? With a mere 8 days you are spreading yourselves very, very thin and are going to be eating up extremely valuable time getting from one place to another with hardly any time on the ground once you're there.

Having been to Paris should never preclude going again, and it's not as though you have to stay within the city limits.

Hello All,

1. Thank you for taking the time to help! Yes, Colmar is scratched off since too far & not convenient to fly.
2. We will arrive at Amsterdam on Sat 4/11 around 8 am. Are museums open on the weekend?
3. How many days should we stay in Amsterdam?
4. Which neighborhood to stay so we can experience Amsterdam in a short time?
5. We are thinking of flying from Amsterdam to Austria & stay a few days then fly back to Paris
6. We are debating visiting Vienna, Austria or Naples, Italy from Amsterdam?
6. We want to visit the college that our daughter spends the whole semester there - so we plan only to be there only 2 days & fly home to DC.
7. Total trip is 8 days - flying into Amsterdam 4/11 & fly out of Paris 4/19.

I sounds like you already have tickets Amsterdam in, Paris out. Maybe that's enough. Or consider adding Brussels, which is easy by train.

2. Yes. All weekend
3. At least 2, ie, 3 nights. Where are you arriving from? Wondering about jet lag, which will cancel some of your plans on the saturday.
4. Amsterdam is small and has excellent public transport, so any neighbourhood is good for experiencing Amsterdam. However, do try to stay clear from very heavy touristy areas, like the area around Nieuwmarkt and the RLD, and now also De Pijp. Areas I would recommend are: around Vondelpark, near Sarphatipark, the area to the east of Nieuwmarkt (Lastageweg, Kromme Waal etc), Scheldebuurt (Near Europaplein Metro) and Oud Zuid.
5. Don't be tempted to add a 3rd destination: you don't really have time.
6. Don't be tempted to add a 3rd destination: you don't really have time.
6B. Why the reluctance to visit Paris again? Do you think you've "seen" it?
7. 8 days on the calendar, is 7 actual days, excluding one arrival day (jet lag) which makes it 6. You spend 2 days in Amsterdam, minus 1 travel day is 5. Minus departure day is 4. Spend those in Paris! Or go somewhere in France that's not Paris. It's a large country.

"Thank you for taking the time to help! Yes, Colmar is scratched off since too far & not convenient to fly."

Visiting Colmar makes much more sense than Vienna or Naples. It takes less than 3 hours by direct train from Paris. You could even do it as a daytrip.

Point is, they're not really going to Paris. Only flying out from there and seeing their daughter's suburban college.

Sorry, but visiting Colmar makes absolutely NO sense whatsoever. Visiting Vienna or Naples is equally idiotic. I fail to understand how people think they can meander over an entire continent in a few days. And to use the word "experience" is a real "fake news" moment.

Thank you for your recommendations of the areas of Amsterdam! Very helpful!

If you search for accommodation on Booking or similar, you can use map view to zoom in on areas.
Two places I like very much are Volkshotel on Wibautstraat and Zoku on Weesperstraat: both are a fair bit out of the centre. Volkshotel is almost over a metro stop, so getting to the centre is very easy, yet you are outside of the crowds entirely and in a gentrifying area, Amsterdam Oost.

Have you checked out Rheims between Amsterdam and Paris, more along the mainlines and a lovely visit