So this weekend we drove up to the Netherlands to visit Dr Mark and Rianne in Leiden (about half an hour out of Amsterdam). They may call it the land of windmills, but my overactive imagination had me expecting them here, there and everywhere. Admittedly, there were a lot (and a lot more if you include the wind farms), but most (all?) were of the decommissioned variety. Mostly there for good looks, and for a bit of fun on a Sunday. Novelty purposes only. Apparently they were put in place to keep the water table from flooding everything in sight (since there the groundwater level is so high/country is below sea level) and used to pump water around from A to B. Now I guess they have better methods of managing the water levels, and from what I hear it makes the engineers here quite the masters of water management.

We decided that to make the most of the weekend, we had better start a day early. And as such we headed off on Friday morning. On the way, we stopped in at a condemned town called Doel on drive to the Netherlands & spent some time roaming the streets. Apparently the town was scheduled to be demolished in order to expand the docks in the nearby harbour. However, a small contingency of locals refused to leave. And as a result, there is now a town that is (mostly) dead, except for the grizzled few that refuse to go (who keep surprisingly well kept abodes, in the midst of all the shambolic decay around them). The empty houses and streets are now a popular haunt for street artists, and we went to get a good look in the interests of some free entertainment. It was totally well worth the visit, and the graffiti on the whole, was quite good. There was even a few cafes still operational (probably catering to tourists on the weekend perhaps), so it was quite a weird mishmash of both deserted and not…  We saw a total of 7 people during our visit, and they were all also exploring the empty streets and taking photos (or contributing to the local artwork). It was a strange experience. Thanks again to Atlas Obscura, for another good (if odd) place to visit on our travels.

On the drive, we also stopped in at the Hague to check out the beach. It was freezing and windy as, and the sand was making a solid effort at biting holes in our legs. However, we couldn’t go past the prospect of visiting the Bondi Beach cafe, and so we enjoyed the sunshine and water views whilst ensconced behind a wind barrier, making the beach a much more comfortable visit than when we arrived. Good weather for the kite surfers, though, and they were out in force.

Eventually, we arrived in Leiden. Hung out with Dr Mark, Rianne and some of their friends in Leiden for dinner and all in all had a wonderful night out in quite a lovely town.

I explored the local bird sanctuary while Murray went out for a ride with Dr Mark and after we went into Amsterdam via train to do a bit of exploring. Unbelievably, the train pay station a) wouldn’t accept our credit cards to pay for the tickets and b) only took coins. So we had to pay nearly 40 euro in coins, to get our tickets. Needless to say, we didn’t have that sort of coinage, who would? Luckily the local convenience store clerk helped us out, although it felt pretty ridiculous asking for basically AUD $60 in coins (I can only imagine how cranky I’d be if at work if someone asked me for that). Retrospectively, that was quite an expensive train trip, but it was a nice ride through the countryside and it was lovely to see the flower fields from a higher vantage point.

When we arrived, the place was abuzz with thousands of people. As such, we spent the first hour or so more or less wading through a sea of tourists, moving at little over a crawl. It was certainly not quite the kind of experience I was looking for, and so perhaps my first impressions of Amsterdam may have been somewhat tainted by irritation at the sheer numbers of other tourists ambling along at snails pace. I had initially thought it might be nice to visit the Anne Frank museum or another of the many museums in the city, but it was simply way too busy, and any ideas of that sort of thing went right out the window.

As we didn’t have anything we really wanted to see, we spent the afternoon just walking about the town (doing our best not to freeze in the super chilly wind). We satisfied ourselves with checking out the local flower market (more like spring bulbs, not actual flowers) and the many cheese shops (much like the ubiquitous Belgian chocolate shops), and some of the local architecture (which like everywhere else, was mostly in a state of refurbishment).

The centre of town featured a carnival of sorts, with a range of thrill rides with bright flashing lights and noise. I don’t think it was a special event or anything, but it made for a pretty weird experience trying to appreciate the nearby town hall and cathedral whilst also seeing someone get slingshotted by a giant bungy at the same time. It took me several photos to get one without someone on a thrill ride somewhere in the shot.

I didn’t really have any expectations of what Amsterdam city might be like (and didn’t do much research prior to visiting). Turns out that the city is interwoven with canals. How about that. Guess that makes sense with the high groundwater situation. Needless to say, there were multitudes (of tourists) on the river also, exploring the city via canal boats. From what I hear, this is situation normal on the weekend.

It has been interesting to see how different the architecture in the Netherlands is compared to what we have seen in France and Belgium. The Netherlands definitely seems to be much more modern again than Belgium (and Belgium seemed more modern than France). Newer buildings, different building styles, and thousands of bikes. Thousands and thousands of bikes. I suspect everyone owns at least one, if not more bikes per person. And it makes sense, as the infrastructure here is totally focused on making riding a bike a safe and convenient alternative to driving (for people of all ages). Also helps when the land is uber flat. No hills to ride up (or down). Flat as a tack. Which means it is also quite windy (no surprises re. the windmill situation). It was strange walking through the crowded Amsterdam streets having to primarily avoid cyclists rather than cars.

Since it was so busy, we had thought it would be great to find a nice spot in the sun at a cafe, however it turned out to be more difficult than expected. There wasn’t a whole lot of warmth to be had if you weren’t in direct sunlight, and it seemed that every last bit of sunshine was already occupied by the hordes of people at all the cafes in town. We did eventually find a spot, and relaxed and watched the canal boats go by (and tourists, with souvenirs that they had purchased at the nearby public loo?). In the end, we tried to escape the crowds and ended up walking a couple of km out of the city centre to visit a local brewery instead. And the tourists evaporated (along with almost everyone else). We even spent a fair stint walking essentially on empty streets. However, it turned out there was more than a respectable contingency of people at the brewery. So we didn’t stay long. We deliberated over whether to stay in Amsterdam or just go home, since it seemed the day would have been better spent exploring the lovely local town of Leiden (where we were staying) instead. We voted to stay longer (as it was a pricey trip out) and eventually ended our day with dinner at a Himalayan restaurant and made our way home. Retrospectively, we probably should have visited Amsterdam on a weekday & perhaps we would have escaped the bedlam in town. Note to self: do touristy stuff on days not including the weekend, as masses of tourists can really stuff up your day.

Sunday was spent making our way home, with the first stop being the Keukenhof gardens. Every year from March to May the gardens present a spectacular display of spring bulbs, forming the second largest expo of its kind in the world. It was certainly epic, with more tulips, hyacinth, & daffodils than I have ever seen in one place. On top of that they had many other flowers on display, and it all got a bit overwhelming. Not to mention that this was also a tourist trap (clearly didn’t pay enough attention to that previous note to self). Bus loads upon bus loads of tourists were there (and we had arrived relatively early). When we eventually left, the traffic outside the entrance was utterly ridiculous. People endeavouring to go to visit the gardens essentially caused almost complete standstill to the traffic. Too bad if you weren’t planning on visiting the garden and just got stuck in it, because the traffic was backed up for kilometres. Epic traffic fail. Although maybe not so bad as some article I read about someone running out of petty in the Indooroopilly Westfield car park the other day because the exits get clogged with traffic on Sundays. Seriously?

On the way home, Murray took me to see some of the countryside that he had gone riding through, and the small towns and canals were stunning to see. Some areas are more affected by the high water table than others, and as a result there are places where many of the houses are completely surrounded by water, and accessible only via a small bridge to the property. It’s so beautiful. Many properties are not only surrounded by water, but also back onto a lake (lucky sods, they all get their own island to live on). Bit of a different take on the term “absolute waterfront”.

We visited the Brouwerij De Molen (The Mill) brewery for lunch on the way home, and I think this may have been the highlight of the weekend for Murray. Plenty of sour beer to find in their bottle shop (in the Netherlands, still), which has been a refreshing change from our experience thus far (it’s actually been much harder to find sour beer than expected, given that the area we are living in is the home of sour beer). We then visited 2 more breweries on the way home (three if you count the one that had already closed for the day), since it seems this whole countryside is riddled with them. It was interesting to have a sticky beak at the local breweries, and it was a shame that we missed going on a tour of the Trappist brewery that we visited. It is beyond strange to think that a major source of the finest beers produced are prepared by monks in an abbey in this day and age.

Finally we made it home. Thank goodness. Another road trip done and dusted and still in one piece.