Damrak, landmark street in Amsterdam, Netherlands

Damrak is a long straight street in Amsterdam, Netherlands, running from the front of the central railway station to the large open square at the city's center. It has a mix of old canal houses with brick gables on one side and busy shops, hotels, and eateries on the other, with a narrow strip of water still visible near the former stock exchange.

The street began as a watery harbor arm of the Amstel river, filled with ships and trading goods until the late 1800s. After parts of the water were filled in and the railway station opened, it changed into a main walking route between the station and the city center.

The name comes from an old Dutch word for a straight stretch of water, a reminder that this was once a canal where boats docked to unload goods. Today, a remnant of that water, called the Wet Damrak, still carries tour boats beside the backs of old houses, letting you see the street much as it worked centuries ago.

Early morning is the easiest time to walk here, before large tour groups and commuter bikes fill the pavement. Keep to the side lanes or the small alleys off the main road if you want to look at the building facades without being pushed along by the crowd.

One hotel at the top of the street was built around two small seventeenth-century houses whose owners refused to sell, so their old facades are sandwiched inside a much larger building. If you look carefully at the roofline from the station end, you can spot the little gables that predate the hotel by two hundred years.