£100 Trip in Amsterdam

In Amsterdam two hundred quid buys a weekend break including bed, breakfast and travel by air or rail with different prices.  Be steer clear of tourist traps, pick and choose the best of the sight meals out, drinks, museums, transport, the lot.s and adopt a few local habits you can live it up for two days on £100. Here are some tips for you.

First, get a bike. Amsterdam is a pedaller's paradise: it's famously flat, has 250 miles of cycle paths, and very few cars. Biking not only gets you out of the city's commercialised centre and into its more fashionable outlying neighbourhoods, it also gives you a sense of belonging. Suddenly you're not a gawping spectator, but a participant in the action. Rent from Mac Bike 0 31 20-6200985) outside Centraal Station; £9.28 for 48 hours.

At the tourist office opposite the station buy a street map (£1.42) then head east along Oosterdokskade to the 11-storey CS Post building.

The Stedelijk - to be frank - is disappointing. You won't see any Mondriaans and Rothkos; instead the galleries are given over to contemporary work, most of which is difficult and obscure. Unless that's your thing, save the £6.42 entry fee and splash out £1.30 on a coffee at 11.

Nearby, in the heart (if that's the right word) of the Red Light District is the city's most intriguing musuem, the Amstelkring (Oudezijds Voorburgwal 40): three adjoining canal houses knocked through during the Reformation to create a clandestine church where Catholics could worship without fear of persecution. The narrow chapel - Our Lord in the Attic - has a baroque altar, hanging galleries and a hefty organ. But just as extraordinary is the house itself, preserved in 16th-century aspic, even down to the box beds and the privy in the kitchen. Entry is £5.

For lunch, head to Walem (Keizersgracht 449, 6253544), a stylish glass-and-perspex cafe with a sunny canalside terrace, a leafy back garden and a great sandwich menu. A toasted smoked salmon club with guacamole plus a glass of wine will set you back £7.71, service included. Then go shopping. Amsterdam is rightly famous for its street markets: Waterlooplein is the biggest and most popular with tourists; but more interesting is the 100-year-old Albert Cuyp market in the earthy southern district of De Pijp. There you can buy everything from cheese slicers to salsa CDs, herring sandwiches to tulip bulbs. Best bargain: a heavy-duty bicycle lock: £7.14.

Dinner in Amsterdam can be anything from a bag of chips upwards. Top of the pile is supertrendy Supperclub (Jonge Roelensteeg 21, 3446400) where diners lie on white mattresses and are fed from silver trays before decamping downstairs to an all-red nightclub. The meal costs £47 but with drinks you can easily spend £100 per head.

Too, too much - in every sense - but, fortunately, the people behind Supperclub have just opened an equally stylish and cheaper restaurant called Envy (3446407, Prinsengracht 38) where a salad with duck confit, anchovies and parmesan, a dessert and a glass of wine costs £12.50. The look is designer industrial and you eat at long wooden benches so it's easy to make friends. Book ahead - it's popular.

After that, barcrawl. Head to Korte Leidsedwarsstraat where a beer at sultry Shanghai-style Suzy Wong (6266769) under mirrored ceilings, and another clicking your fingers to live jazz at Cafe Alto (6263249) will set you back a total of £4.18.

In the morning blow away the cobwebs on the bike, freewheeling along the graceful residential streets of Grachtengordel, crossing Magere Brug, the "skinny bridge", and cruising around Vondelpark where on a fine day half the city goes to picnic, jog and canoodle in the grass.

According to the tourist office, three out of four visitors to Amsterdam take a canal cruise in a glass-topped boat. Tempted? Well, go ahead if you really must. We'll meet you afterwards. Us? Oh, we'll be having a coffee and a slice of delicious apple tart at Cafe Vertigo (6123021), a leafy suntrap at the north end of Vondelpark. Cost: £3.75.

Another "must see" on the tourist circuit is the Van Gogh Museum (Paulus Potterstraat 7). Now, you may feel you're familiar with all those sunflowers and cornfields, but don't believe it. Up close, even with crowds jostling, you'll be knocked out by the sheer vividness of the colours, the manic brushwork, the desperate sadness that seeps into every canvas. Well worth £7.14.

Head north into the working class district of Jordaan, now partially gentrified but still fresh and funky. There are some fun shops: on Rozengracht you'll find SPRMRKT, a former supermarket selling vintage clothes and 1970s furniture, and Wonen 2000, a design store-cum-coffee bar in a mould-breaking futuristic building. For lunch Winkel (Nordermarkt 43, 6230223) charges £5.85 for goats cheese on toast with salad and a soft drink.

It would be tempting to spend the rest of the afternoon chilling in cafes and bars (or coffeeshops, if you're inclined that way). But for one last shot of culture head to the Nieuwe Kerk (Dam Square). It's not new - think 15th-century Gothic - and it's not free to get in - think £5.71 - but it does put on some wonderful exhibitions. The current one, about how different cultures view nature, is multimedia eye candy; very modern-meets-medieval; very Dutch. It ends October 23.

You can't leave Amsterdam without having an Indonesian rijsttafel. Despite an unpromising location on a neon-lit side street, Puri Mas (Lange Leidsedwarsstraat 37, 62777627) has excellent food and charming service. A dozen dishes and a large beer cost £16.07.

Round off the evening at Rain (Rembrandtplein 44, 626 7078), a spanking new cocktail lounge packed with flaxen-haired beauties of both sexes where cocktails - including a rose petalini - cost £5.71.

Total spend: £99.18.