A home exchange to the Netherlands
We decided that while we are in North Holland it would be a great opportunity to visit Berlin. We’ve heard that Berlin has some interesting things happening and we decided to see for ourselves. We used our Trainline app to buy two return tickets to Berlin leaving Amsterdam at 7.00am on a Wednesday morning. This meant…
Today we cycled to the station with the plan of visiting Den Haag; or as we’ve heard it for years: The Hague. A quick visit to the big yellow machine to top up the credit on the chip card and onto the train; an Intercity from Enkhuizen, taking us to Amsterdam Sloterdijk where we’ll change to…
So, in a wonderful serendipity, the TAPT Beer Festival happened to be taking place in beautiful Rembrandt Park, south west of the main city. We set off by bike from our Hoorn home and leave our bikes at the station. Half an hour later and we’re at Amsterdam Centraal. Using both Rome2Rio and CityMapper we’ve…
Wow! what a lovely city. Checking out Haarlem was one of those ‘what do we want to do tomorrow?’ conversations and turned out to be a great discovery. This is one of the huge benefits we’re finding of being in the same place for an extended period. We can move at our own pace and…
In the last week, as we’ve pedalled or walked along the harbour, we’ve seen comings and goings of a number of different boats and ships. Canal and river cruisers, here from Cologne via inland waterways, tall ships with square and schooner rigs, traditional boats with heavy rigs and ‘ears’ that look like they can be…
The end of the week rolls around with the added double shot of being Friday 13th and also a full moon. We decide that access to decent coffee is a good start, so we call in to one of the cafes that we’ve found that serves good coffee. The Het Koffie Lokaal serves a nice…
We’ve been lucky when finding a home exchange to end up in a lovely spot in a very beautiful and historic town just North of Amsterdam. Hoorn is just 31 minutes by train from Amsterdam Centraal station and the train runs every half hour; an intercity which commences its trip at Enkhuizen to the North…
We got to talking with another couple who told us about the side of Amsterdam which is rarely seen by the hordes of tourists who roam the red light district and the inner canals all the time; through the bustle of cafes and coffee shops and attractions. So, in what is apparently typical Autumn weather…
We’ve been making lists of places to travel to and experience. The other day, it was time to head to Utrecht, to the South East of Amsterdam. Luckily, every half hour there is a train from Hoorn which travels through Amsterdam and Utrecht on its way further afield. So a pleasant one hour trip in…
We’ve now had a few days to experience different ways of doing things and thinking about things. Hoorn itself is a gorgeous small city. Back in the 1600s, when Holland was expanding its colonial interests with Indonesia being one of the main objectives, Hoorn played a vital role for the Dutch East India Company; or…