Traveling Blog: The Netherlands May 2017

For the love of mother language, this post should be written in Indonesia. But for the love of me, I feel awkward writing in Indonesian, so this post would be written in English.

As all of my friends know, I was just got home from a long 3 weeks holiday in Europe. My itinerary would be like this: 

22 April -23 April  : On the plane to Rome, Italy

23 April - 26 April : Rome, Italy

26 April - 27 April : Venice, Italy

28 April - 2 May    : Paris, France

2 May - 11 May     : Haarlem, The Netherlands

And since I kept writing on my journals about Rome, Venice, and Paris. I will be writing first about the Netherlands, since I will for sure forgetting about the journey if I'm not putting it on writing.

So for everybody will be going to the Netherlands, it probably would be the best country in the world that you've ever visited. For me, because my older family like my father and the generation before him was having a Dutch education, and they still spoke the language and put on the norms working in our family, The Netherlands feels so familiar. Though I don't speak Dutch, but everybody in Netherlands speaks perfect English.

I've stayed in Haarlem, on my grandma's little sister. Haarlem is a very nice small city, where everybody wants to help if you looked confused on the street. And you practically can walk everywhere around the city. Although maybe it's about 2-3 km walks, the air is so nice and the pavements around the city were made for walking. But if you don't feel like walking, than take the bus or train, they got a very nice system for transportations, that made having a car is useless. And also, they use bike a lot. Many people are having cars, because they work in a different cities. 

Canal of Haarlem

Driving in The Netherlands was also very nice. The roads are wonderful, with not so many traffic. You can practically drove for 1 hour on 30 km distance. How nice it is? Since we who lived in Jakarta used to drive for 2 hours on 10 km distance.

About the weather, May was supposed to be spring to summer weather on Europe. But thank you, global warming! The weather was around 6-12 degrees on Haarlem, Volendam, and Amsterdam. It would be different on Utrecht and Delft, since these cities were located a little bit further from the sea.

About the food. Of I love the food here! Practically heaven for everybody who enjoys meat, milk, chocolate, and bread. For those who didn't eat western food, you don't have to worry. There are plenty of good Indonesian and Chinese restaurants here. 

Another thing about Netherland is, you have to go here, if you really liked shopping. A lot of things to buy and the prices are not over expensive like in Paris or Rome. The Netherlands is heaven for younger shoppers. You can go to every shopping street on Netherlands, they got some mid-ends brands. You can search for footlocker, or H&M on every shopping street on the country. If you search for a little bit pricey and high-end brand, then you can go to shopping district like Roermond, or Bataviastaad (just make sure you have a rental car, since you'll have to travel far for these shopping districts).

So enough with the introduction about Netherlands, not sure if I were able to wrote this long about Paris and Rome, or Venice though. Let's go for the journals.

You practically can go anywhere by bus or train from Amsterdam Centraal. Just buy an OV Chip card from the counter or the machine (you need to buy with card or coins using machines). The card itself costs 7,5 euros. You're going to need 20 euros deposit if you want to use train, and 5 euros deposit to use bus. But travelling using bus or train was much more cheaper than using taxi. But if you go by people more than 3, it was cheaper using taxi.

A first must to if you ever visited Holland on spring is Keukenhof (read: Kokenhof). Yes yes, it was the famous garden, home for 7000 kinds of tulips. Keukonhof is located on Lisse, close from Haarlem and Amsterdam. Keukenhof was only open for March until end of May every year, since tulips were only bloomed on these months of spring. Me, myself, I've never liked flowers. Since they're all well, just flowers. But these tulips were too beautiful to be true. And worry not, there are no insects around the tulips. Tips for visiting Keukenhof: go at the weekdays, the crowds are not as much as if you go at the weekends. Bring your best camera, take a lot of pictures. Buy the ticket online, some hotels can buy it for you too so you don't have to lining up for tickets. Wear a lot of sunscreen. Take a whole day to explore, since this garden is so large you'll also need extra time to lining up for taking good pictures. It cost 16 euro per person to enter Keukenhof.

Then, if you're young and loves to shop, as I say. Amsterdam was a good place to spend money. I love shoes, sneakers especially. And believe me, footlocker was heaven! A lot of sneakers here, with a lot more fine quality than those that sold in Jakarta. The price was not too different from Jakarta. But, the quality was a lot more nicer. And if you go to Netherlands, don't forget to buy jeans. They love jeans so much you'll see everyone wearing them. 

Beautiful City of Amsterdam

For me, another must visit place if you go to Amsterdam is, Van Gogh Museum. I was a little bit fanatic for him. Lining up a long queue in Paris just for Van Gogh at D'Orsay. Smarter this time, I book the ticket online, and get up early so the queue is not that long. Too bad they didn't allowed any pictures on every room on this museum. But you have to visit here. A little bit too modern for his era, Van Gogh suffered from mental illness, that caused him to kill himself by the early age of 37. Before he shot himself, he painted a lot more at the year he died. He was also a good writer, he wrote mostly to his brother, and these letters were also exhibited at Van Gogh's museum. It was cost 17 euros per person to enter Van Gogh museum (so expensive, but it was worth the price).

Let's move on to other city. I was given chance to visit another city at Netherlands such as Utrecht, Delft, and Volendam. I'm going to talk about these three city briefly before write more about Haarlem. So Utrecht was basically a city for students. Many young people live and study here, that's why the city is so lively with a market right down below the central station, and a big mall. The mall is new, and filled with middle end brands. Funny thing about other cities than Amsterdam are, the shops are closed at 6 pm sharp. But the bars, and restaurants closed later at 12.30 at Haarlem, and more late in Utrecht, maybe because a lot of young people loves to chit chat after class and work in Utrecht, but there not a lot of young people in Haarlem. Utrecht has warmer weather than Amsterdam and Haarlem at noon. But in the evening, the degrees are relatively the same as other cities on Netherlands.

In Utrecht, there is an ex-prison that now closed due to the shortage of prisoners. Also, there's a tower of Church in every city that I've ever visited on the Netherlands. And they always called this as a city square. In Utrecht, no buildings can go higher than the tower of the Church in the city square. That's why you don't see any skyscraper around Holland. You can get to Utrecht by Intercity train from Amsterdam Centraal.

City Square of Utrecht, there are 425 steps to climb

There is also a nice park called the Grift Park. There is a small zoo consisting of farm animals. And I kid you not, the animals were all so tamed it could be mistaken as a pet dog instead of cows and goats. They didn't smell at all, and all so fat and well-maintained. A lot of young people and young families visit this park. When summer came, there would be no place to walk at all since many people came and sunbath here.

Volendam is a fishing village right up in North Holland. If you go on tour to Netherlands, they always visit Volendam. A tourists city. The most famous would be taking pictures with traditional clothes of Dutch, and a cheese factory. If you go on by yourself, I wouldn't be suggesting on staying at Volendam, you'll get bored fast. Taking one person's pictures usually cost for 15 euros, it added up more depends on how many people on the pictures. You can ride a bus here from Amsterdam Centraal, the bus is 316. Just make sure you have a lot of balance on your OV Chip cards. If you don't have an OV card, one trip to Amsterdam costs 10 euro.

Next city is Delft, famous for its own ceramics factory that made the famous Dutch blue pattern. Since now it was still called as Delft Blue, google it. It cost a lot to go to Delft. If you have an OV chip card, it cost 13 euro one trip from Amsterdam Centraal.

City Square of Delft

Let's talk about Haarlem now. Haarlem is located on North Holland, and is also a municipality. It took 15 minutes by train from Amsterdam to Haarlem, and 30 by driving. And here's the best part, Haarlem was a major beer producer on Netherlands. Don't just stay on Amsterdam when you visit the Netherlands, go to Haarlem too. The city is much more nicer than Amsterdam, although the bars were closed at 12.30 am and most of the restaurants at 10.00 pm, Haarlem is a perfect city to get away if you live in Jakarta. Go for Weekend Market at Grote Markt, located in Haarlem city square, 10 minutes walk from Haarlem Centraal Station. Or go for St. Bavo's Church that located right in front of the City Hall in Haarlem Square. Crazy for shop? Many shops are there too at Haarlem Square.

When I was in Haarlem, I went to Teyler's museum (of course, a museum maniac). Teyler's Museum was a jewel for Haarlem's citizen, they're so proud of this museum. It cost 12 euro to enter Teyler's museum. The collections were diverse, from paintings to science. You can walk from Haarlem Square to Teyler's museum. You can walk anywhere in Haarlem.

Next is the Church of St. Bavo's. As I said, this old Church (Kerk - read Kerek in Dutch, meaning church) was located in the city square. It was built on the 18th century and still standing tall until this day. You need to pay for 4 euros if you want to enter the Church. But if you go there for the mass in Sunday you can enter it for free. Different things about Churches on the Netherlands and Churches on Italy was the art works. In Italy they worked really hard to fill the church with expensive and wonderful artwork from many painters or sculptures. In the Netherlands, they just made the building beautiful without adding excessive artworks. Nevertheless, both are beautiful.

St. Bavo's Church

Sad thing about Christian/Catholic in Netherlands is, there are so many Church closing because simply. the people stopped going to the Church anymore so the closed the Church and made something else different entirely, like this bar called Jopenkerk. Jopenkerk is a brewery in Haarlem. They brew many kinds of beers and it tasted really good and diverse. You have to go to Jopenkerk or buy their beers if you go to Haarlem. They have it sell on every Albert Heijn on every corner of Haarlem. 

As many as you can enjoy in The Netherlands, food, shopping, places to go. I still longing for Indomie when I'm there. I missed my home country every steps I took in Europe. Europe was good, but Indonesia is the best.

Until next time about Paris and Italy (if I'm not lazy to write).