My second visit to Rotterdam was not much longer than my first. After arriving in the evening, I got dinner and spent the rest of the night doing laundry. Washing machines and dryers are much more energy efficient in the EU than the US, which is great, but that also means I had to wait quite a while for my clothes to finish. It didn’t help that the only washing machine and dryer were occupied when I arrived, so my clothes didn’t end of being clean until 1 in the morning. The next morning I slept in a little bit, then left Rotterdam for The Hague. I didn’t try to extend my stay in Rotterdam since I felt I already had a decent grasp of the city’s vibe. Rotterdam is the perfect foil for Amsterdam. Where Amsterdam has short, historic brick buildings, Rotterdam has tall, new glass skyscrapers. While Amsterdam has a lively, hip feel, Rotterdam felt more commercial focused. That’s not to say I didn’t like Rotterdam, but it just felt that the city had less to offer for tourists. I hadn’t visited The Hague (Den Haag in Dutch) yet, and wanted to switch things up to occupy my longest break from farms.
Getting to The Hague was pretty easy 40 min ride from Rotterdam. One of the metro lines in Rotterdam has a terminus in The Hague, so I took that instead of the intercity rail line. The Hague is known as the political capital of the Netherlands, housing the center of Dutch politics as well as many EU institutions. The Hague houses Dutch parliament, even though Amsterdam is the official capital, due to the French. All of the political institutions had long been housed in The Hague, but when Napoleon appointed his brother the king of Holland after he had conquered it, Louis Napoleon found Amsterdam much more suitable for his palace than The Hague. The political institutions eventually moved back to The Hague, but the capital remained in Amsterdam.
After checking into my hostel (or at least leaving my bags in lockers since I arrived well before 4pm check in), I walked around the city for a little bit and got lunch. While part of me wanted to explore The Hague more since I just arrived, I knew I should take advantage of sunny day I was gifted (the forecast for the better part of the next week featured rain). One of the big ticket items I long knew I wanted to visit was Keukenhof, and visiting the outdoor venue in good (by Dutch standards) weather would be ideal.
Keukenhof is a large flower garden in the Netherlands that is open for several weeks a year (end of March through mid May). The well manicured grounds feature of variety of plant bulbs that all bloom at the same time. The park is sometimes known as the Disneyland of the Netherlands, not because of any amusement rides, but because of the throngs of tourists it attracts. While the nice weather would be a great time for me to enjoy the park, it also turned out to be great for the thousands of other tourists who joined me. Before I headed to Keukenhof (which is north of The Hague, and just south of Amsterdam Schiphol), I stopped for a layover in Leiden.
Leiden is a college town just north of The Hague (and south of Keukenhof) and where my bus from Keukenhof would depart from. Reminder that I’ve put pins on many of the places I’ve mentioned on the map viewable at the bottom of the homepage of my site, check that out if you want to orient yourself. I gave myself an hour to walk around Leiden before I hopped on my bus, and the city ended up being very beautiful to walk around. Like many of the Dutch and Belgian cities I had already visited, Leiden is covered in a network of canals. Unlike Amsterdam, Leiden had a much quieter atmosphere that made it easier to enjoy the canals.
After walking around for an hour, I moseyed my way back to Leiden central to catch my bus. The bus for Keukenhof was very well marked, with its own sign, attendants, and roped off line to board the bus.
The quick 25 min bus ride was easy, the only weird thing was that the driver had to be like 16 years old (there was an older worker watching over him though). Once we got to Keukenhof, I saw the Disneyland connection in the parking lot. In what was easily the biggest parking I’ve seen so far in the country, there had to be a hundred full size tour buses.
Even though the park is decently large (not nearly as big as Disneyland though), the throngs of tourists still made it feel quite crowded. The park did live up to my expectations in term of flowers though – there had to be hundreds of different varieties of tulips, hyacinths, and crocuses that came in almost every color. While the flowers were organized in neat beds, only one bed was manicured in a way to spell out something.
The outer ring of the park was more exposed to the sun, and the inner circle featured networks of canals, lakes, and trees.
There were about 5 pavilions located throughout the park as well, these featured flower art, shops, and restaurants.
Similar to the open air museum in Arnhem, dogs were also allowed in Keukenhof, and I did get a photo this time. Even though I’m sure the dogs loved the new smells, they had to be careful to not get trampled underneath the feet of selfie taking tourists.
I also loved to look at the names of the flowers; some of them were quite unusual and fun. I’ll share the best ones below:
All of the different beds had signs alongside them that featured organizations from across the Netherlands, most organizations seemed to be flower companies. I’m guessing they contributed the flowers that are planted there.
There were also some other random fun things in the park:
In one of the indoor spaces, there was a exhibit featuring the history of Keukenhof. I really enjoyed looking at the promotional posters created for each year the park opened.
I figured there had to be somewhere in the park where I could buy this year’s edition, and the docent nearby confirmed my hunch. The first shop I visited didn’t have any copy of the poster. Neither did the second. I asked the shopkeeper if she had any. She didn’t, but she thought the first shop I visited did. When I told her they didn’t either, she recommended I visit another one. Long story short, I spent about 40 minutes walking to every corner of the park to visit all 5 shops. This was after I had already visited the entire park to look at flowers. Clearly the shops are strategically placed as far as possible from one another. When I completed my loop and got to the information center near the main entrance, I finally learned that the posters have never been sold anywhere. Wish I knew that before. The lady behind the counter did say I was not the first to ask about it though, so Keukenhof, get your act together and start selling the posters.
I began the next day with a walking tour of the city. The guide, Niels, was pretty good, and probably about the same age as me. Our tour was very climactic at the start, as we began next to Binnenhof, the building that houses Dutch parliament. For the 15 minutes we were there, we saw a smattering of Dutch ministers:
We spent the rest of the tour walking around the inner city, learning more about the history of the city and the stories behind its most famous sites and objects (including the Girl with the Pearl Earring, which I would visit next). Apparently the earring in the famous painting may not be an earring at all, but instead a tin ball, which I guess is something people wore back in the day. Someone noticed that the ball didn’t reflect light the same way a pearl would, and Vermeer was well known for his ability to accurately draw light.
After the tour, I sought out a Surinamese restaurant for lunch. It’s essentially the same explanation for why there are lots of Indonesian restaurants in the Netherlands: colonization. The restaurant I chose had lots of good reviews on google, but the food was just okay. The food resembled Indian food a lot, which makes sense since the Dutch brought over “workers” from their Southeast Asian colonies to man plantations there once slavery was abolished (slaves had primarily been African).
I then headed over to the Mauritshuis, the home of many Dutch master works. The museum felt like a smaller version of the Rijksmuseum, with the same grand entryway and organized coat check within a historical building.
The most famous item in the museum is the Girl with the Pearl Earring by Vermeer, which everyone knows long before entering (every tourist shop sells merchandise with the painting’s semblance). The museum is also home to the Goldfinch by Fabritius, made famous by Donna Tartt’s novel (which I thoroughly enjoyed and highly recommend, it did win a Pulitzer after all). Unlike the novel thankfully, no explosions went off when I visited the painting (shoutout to the 3 people reading this who read the book).
Both famous paintings were viewable up close, especially in comparison to all of the guardrails surrounding the Mona Lisa at the Louvre. I remember Klimt’s the Kiss in Vienna was also really easy to view up close. I guess people just really like to mess with the Mona Lisa.
I’m not any sort of art history guru, but the other paintings throughout the museum were nice enough to look at. The audio guide system was essentially the same as that at the Rijksmuseum: an app that would guide you to each painting at the museum. Two differences that made this version slightly worse: the app didn’t have the bluetooth capability to show you which room you were in, and the audio piece for each painting was significantly longer than the ones at the Rijksmuseum. It’s hard to keep valuable real estate in front of a painting for the entire 3 minute clip.
One cool feature of the paintings is that many of them were painted by artists with great first names:
It’s clearly a very common Dutch first name, many streets in all of the cities I’ve visited have “Jacob” incorporated somehow. I’ll do a post highlighting all of them eventually.
After the Mauritshuis, I visited the Peace Palace, home to the International Court of Justice (home to where Israel has recently been under trial). This was a super short visit since tours of the actual palace need to be scheduled far in advance, so I only walked through the small visitor center.
The next day (Saturday) was my last in The Hague, as I had accommodations booked in Utrecht that night. I decided to spend most of the day in The Hague though, as I thought there was still more to do there. After checking out of the hostel and putting my bags in lockers, I took the tram out to the beach. I had no intention of walking on the sand or swimming in the frigid North Sea, but most travel guides for The Hague recommended visiting the boardwalk and pier at Scheveningen.
I really don’t have too much to say about visiting the beach, except that I can see why many Dutch take their holidays in Spain or along the French Riviera.
Everyone had on their winter parkas, not what you’d expect to see at a beach. There were lots of restaurants and shops along the water, but they were mostly empty. A large area was also fenced off for construction. The pier (which had an indoor and outdoor level) was clearly trying to go for American beach vibes, but the stained carpet didn’t help its case.
After visiting the beach, I took the tram back towards The Hague. I’m sure the beach would be better in the summer (just like my second farm lol). It is nice how easily accessible the beach is from the center of town, though. I also should probably mention this is considered the nicest beach in the country (and I guess the region too, since German tourists are known to visit), but that fact further proves why the Dutch like to head south for their holiday.
Instead of heading all of the way back into The Hague, I stopped about halfway. I stopped because I wanted to visit Madurodam, a theme park featuring miniature versions of sites from across the Netherlands. If you’ve ever been to Miniland USA within Legoland, it’s the same concept. Outside of the entrance, I hemmed and hawed for a bit, trying to decide if I wanted to go in (tickets cost almost $30). Ultimately I decided to go for it. I didn’t have any other ideas of how to spend the time before taking a train to Utrecht later. The park was cool, but ultimately not worth the $30 (especially considering it was the most expensive entrance fee of anywhere I had visited thus far).
While the park was clearly catered to toddlers (there were so many crying kids running around), there was also a mix of older and younger tourists. It was cool to see buildings I have seen in real life miniaturized. Of course I have not visited many of the places featured yet (and likely won’t visit on this trip), so I’d say this counts towards visiting all of the Netherlands.
The park featured a decent array of interactive activities. Outside of the center of miniature buildings, there were immersive theaters where you could learn about Dutch history.
Throughout the rest of the park, there were games that related to the buildings they accompanied (ex: flight simulator next to Schiphol). These games were really not that great compared to other interactive exhibits I had seen at museums. They were also largely unused given the park’s predominant customer hadn’t learned how to read yet.
I ended up spending a little more than a hour at the park. It was good to visit, but I’d say it ultimately wasn’t worth it. I walked through a park (it was just eh) en route to the tram, which I took back to the hostel. I then grabbed by stuff and got on my way to Utrecht.
Stepping back a bit, this prolonged break between farms has started to grow tiring for its own reasons. While work on the last farm got old quickly, exploring new cities by myself has its own doldrums. I love exploring new places, but I never planned to have an entire week on my own between farms (of course this happened because I left Fruitweelde early). I’ve talked to a few people here and there, but haven’t had the steady opportunities for conversation I had at both farms. Exploring new places is awesome, but it’s missing something without someone to share your new realizations with.
Right now the plan is to leave for farm number 3 on Tuesday evening, and hopefully spend 2 weeks there. I have plans in place to travel on both weekends I’m there, more on that once they get closer. From now until Tuesday I’ll be in Utrecht, which will be the subject of my next blog post.
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