itinerary to include Amsterdam

How about Paris, Brugges and Amsterdam - that would make a nice 2 week trip.

Bruges, Paris, and London are good options. But a lot of night trains operate out of Amsterdam Centraal Station to: Munich, Basel/Zurich, Prague, Copenhagen, Milan, and Vienna.

It might be neat to leave Amsterdam in the evening and wake up in the Swiss Alps the next day!

For more info check out www.citynightline.ch

I suggest adding Bruges and Brussels (one hour away from each other on the train - stay in one and day trip to the other). I think these are two of the most underrated places in Europe. Then continue south to Paris, which deserves every bit of the hype it gets. Arthur Frommer named Paris as his "favorite city in Europe" and I am hard pressed to agree. Day trip from Paris to Versailles, or deeper in France if you are up for it. Rick Steves includes both Bruges and Paris in his "Best of Europe" guide so they are favorites of his also, and you wouldn't have to spend a lot of time travelling from Amsterdam. It's hard to answer your question without knowing your travel style - slow and in-depth or frantic and whirlwind...

I like the Amsterdam, Bruges & Paris itinerary -- with a stop in Brussels on the way to Bruges. We rented a great apt in Bruges (thru VRBO) and an apt in Paris. Stayed in the 't Hotel in Amsterdam -- not fancy but on a lovely canal -- very large rooms & windows. In fact we liked that trip so much we are doing it again next year!

I actually managed London, Amsterdam, Bruges, Paris and Versailles last year in 2 weeks. Just enough time to see each comfortably. Not too much, not too little.
Flying from London to Amsterdam saved a tremendous amount of time. Check out flights on KLM. Much cheaper and faster than the bullet train. Otherwise train it everywhere else.

It is not necessarily faster or cheap to fly from London to Amsterdam (especially if you don't fly out of Heathrow). You can buy €50 one way train tickets from London to Amsterdam on nshighspeed.nl. They train ride is about 5 hours. For me taking a train is way less hassle than flying.

Another advantage is you can stop in Brussels, Rotterdam, or the Hague to site see on your way to Amsterdam.

Do not fly out of a major airport. Use the smaller city airports. It was easy, much faster. I don't think the flight was more than $118.00, one way. I actually had a travel agent convince me and the flight was just an hour as opposed to 5 hours, really even longer, on the high speed train. This gives you so much more time in the major cities you mentioned. Time is money, right? You can only see so much comfortably. It is hard not to keep adding to your itinerary isn't it?!