Amsterdam by bicycle

Amsterdam is well known for it abundance in bikes. Most people who live in Amsterdam at least own a bicycle, a lot of them also use it actively to avoid public transport, or to simply stay fit while in transit in the city.
Amsterdam has a lot of 'safe' bicycle-paths, which are divided from the road, so that there is less risk of getting hit by cars, busses and other motorized vehicles racing through the city.
These bike-paths do however, form a liability in the city, mainly for inexperienced pedestrians.

Inexperienced pedestrians? you will now think, what on earth are inexperienced pedestrians?. Everyone who can walk, has at some point or other participated in traffic as a pedestrian, so there should be no such thing as an 'inexperienced pedestrian'.
In Amsterdam being a pedestrian is a whole different ball-game. We have not only got the cars, trams, busses, taxis and motorcycles to deal with, we also have bicycles...
In general when on a bicycle in Amsterdam rules do not mean all that much. Lots of cyclists ignore stop-signs, trafficlights or other forms of traffic-congestion, let alone respect a pedestrian-zone such as zebra-crossings.
Hence, a lot of pedestrians who are not used to bicycles are completely confused when walking around in Amterdam. Where in a normal city, you cross the road by waiting for the pedestrian light to turn green and assume the traffic is stopped, in Amsterdam you start frantically looking left and right to ensure that there is not a bicycle in sight waiting to jump you.

Back to cycling through Amsterdam.

If you are up to the above, the bike is a great way to experience Amsterdam. A very, or should I say fairly, safe way to gain some expertise in cycling through Amsterdam is to join up in one of the many bicycle-tours of Amsterdam. These tours differ in group size and duration, but one of the best known operators of Amsterdam cycle tours is Yellow Bike.
A tour works as follows, you go to the startpoint, where you get introduced to your group and to your guide. You will also get a bike allocated to you, once you have your bike and have gotten to know the group, the guide will explain you some of the rules to follow while in the group. These rules are mainly there for your own security. Once all of this is clear, you start your tour of Amsterdam on the bike. This really is a unique way of getting to see the city, you pass through streets where cars cannot come, streets that are too far out of the center for walking tours and no canals go through them.

If you are a bit squeamish about doing a bicycle tour, there are alternative ways to do these tours, such as a step-tour or the bicycle-taxi. The bicycle taxi has the advantage of also keeping you dry in the rain, where a step or bike tour just get you soaked, although usually a rain-poncho is provided.