The Netherlands
We have been wanting to do a longer trip to The Netherlands ever since we moved abroad. We visited the small town where my partner’s grandparents are from on a day trip from Cologne, Germany but hadn’t spent a significant amount of time exploring the country.
We ended up with a four day weekend over Easter and found decently priced flights into Eindhoven, the airport in the south. I will say: this was not the best time of year to plan a last minute trip. Not only was it a holiday weekend, but it was peak tulip season. The prices of things like AirBnB’s and hotels…made me want to cry. But we made it work! We did pre-book all tickets for things like parking in Amsterdam, museums, and boat rides as soon as we could and this definitely got us the best prices.
Saturday
We took an early morning flight and arrived in Eindhoven by 8:45am. We picked up our rental car and headed straight for our first destination: the Hansel and Gretel Pancake House in Zeewolded. This was about an hour and fifteen minutes from the airport. We originally planned it as a pit stop on the way to Amsterdam, and then pivoted and ended up spending the afternoon and night with family in Nijmegen. We back tracked a bit in order to do this (100% worth it, not only to see family but also to explore Nijmegen, which is the oldest city in The Netherlands) so I would plan it a little differently next time so we weren’t in the car as much.
The pancake house is a restaurant + playground combination and was over the top fantastical. There were play structures made to look like the witch’s house from the fairy tale, a splash pad (that was on even in mid-April when it was chilly), trampolines, zip lines, a bike race track, and more. We played for about 40 minutes before our lunch reservation and then ate inside. I am glad I booked an indoor table so we could see the fun decorations and experience the wildest thing — the floors of the restaurant moving. Because it is supposed to be the witch’s house, there were little quirks and tricks, like the floor moving up and down randomly. The first time it happened, I looked around and luckily saw a few other moms also amused (and startled) by what was happening.
We ate lunch (both savoury and sweet options were available!), played a little more, and my son got to spend the “witch’s coin” that came with his kid’s meal on a toy in the witch’s store. This was a ton of fun and a great thing to do after a flight and a bit of a drive. We saw several tulip fields in our way and Flevoland, the province we were in, has an entire “tulip route” that will guide you from field to field. This area would definitely be less crowded for tulip visits than the very popular Keukenhof Garden in Lisse (where we went on Tuesday).
After lunch we drove to Nijmegen to stay with family, which was incredibly special. My partner’s grandparents left The Netherlands in the 1960s to immigrate to the United States and he was raised with a lot of love and appreciation for his Dutch heritage. It has been very cool to watch him connect with and explore this part of himself the more time we spend in The Netherlands.
On our next trip, I want to spend more time in Nijmegen. It is a university city, built on a river, and is a beautiful balance of vibrant city life and nature/green space.
Sunday
Our first activity of the day was to drive about an hour and a half north to Zaanse Schans (only about 30 min outside of Amsterdam) for a wooden shoe painting workshop. Zaanse Schans is a UNESCO world heritage site and is most famous for their windmills. There are only a handful left now, but at its height, the village had between 600-900 operational windmills. The village is also very popular because of their wooden shoe museum, “how we make the shoes” demonstrations, and the painting workshop. We booked the first workshop of the day and were the only people in the class. Our guide was incredibly kind, knowledgable, and helped us where we wanted with the actual art (she sketched my tulips for me!). We had an hour and a half to paint and she provided drinks (coffee, juice, water) and cookies. I wasn’t sure how my four year old would do, but he ended up loving it.
After we finished painting, we walked around the village to explore the shops and see the different artisans working (there were bakery and chocolate museums). We then hopped on the small river boat for a 25 min guided tour down the river to learn about the windmills, the particular architecture of the houses on the other side of the river, and the cacao factory. We booked this on GetYourGuide and it was less than €25 for all three tickets plus an open bar option. At the dock, they were advertising for €20+ per person.
For lunch, we left the village and drove a bit down the river to Kathmandu, a Nepalese restaurant. I highly recommend this is you are in the area!
After lunch, we headed to Amsterdam. We stayed at the Hilton Double Tree near the Centraal Train Station, which was a really convenient location. However, the hotel does not have dedicated parking so we had to book parking at the parking garage next door. This wasn’t hard at all, but I’m glad we checked ahead of time to figure this out because driving into the city on Easter Sunday, I think finding parking without a reservation would have been hard.
We checked into the hotel and relaxed a bit before heading out to the NEMO Science Museum, just a short walk away from the hotel. The museum is incredibly hands on and is great for probably ages 3 and up. We even saw teenagers and adults there on their own, so it’s definitely an “all ages” environment.
We walked around the center a bit and then went back to the hotel for an early night. I got our son to bed and Ben was actually able to go out to dinner at the restaurant where one of his cousins works so he could spend some time with her, which I know he appreciated.
Monday
This was our true Amsterdam day. We started off with a canal boat ride. Again, we found it on GetYourGuide. It had great reviews, a good price, and was only an hour long (probably all my 4 year old has the patience for). Our guide was fantastic and it was fun to see the city from the water of the famous canals. I think my favorite thing about Amsterdam is the architecture so this was probably my favorite part of the day.
We tried to go to the Albert Cuyp Markt, only to realize that it is not open on Mondays. But if you’re in Amsterdam, this has been recommended several times as “the place” to go to find amazing stroopwafel (Rudi’s Original Stroop) and to try typical Dutch food like bitterballen and herring.
We spent the afternoon wandering around the city, shopping, and visiting two museums: the Rijksmuseum (the Dutch national museum) and Rembrandthuis, a small museum dedicated to Rembrandt in the home where he lived and worked in Amsterdam for 20 years. The Van Gogh Museum was high on my list, but by the time we went to buy tickets, it was sold out until mid-May. Luckily, we were still about to see some works by Van Gogh at the Rijksmuseum. This was a long day of being on the go and being in art museums, not the most energy releasing places for a 4 year old, so we hit a playground then made our way back to the hotel to give him a room service dinner while we ordered Uber Eats Indonesian food.
Tuesday
Tuesday was for the tulips (and a little more art). We booked 8:30am tickets for the Keukenhof Garden (they open at 8:00am). I read somewhere that people describe this like the Disneyland of tulips and I can absolutely see why. The crowds are likely going to be a lot during peak season. It’s not going to be the calm, quiet, tulip field experience you may see on TikTok. But it was absolutely still worth it. Getting to see how they plant the different gardens, seeing the different species and varieties up close, and seeing the special exhibits like an orchid show and a cut flower display was awesome. They also had playgrounds, food options, and gift shops scattered throughout the park. When booking your tickets online, I definitely recommend adding tickets for the whisper boat. You can choose a specific time (we picked 9:30am) but when we showed up at the ticket desk at 8:50 to collect our tickets, they told us to go ahead and get on the 9:00am boat. The tour was 45 minutes and included an audio guide. The boat went through the canals between the tulips fields, which made for a beautiful perspective we wouldn’t get just driving around to find fields.
Once the crowds started ramping up even more, we headed out. Our plan for lunch was to drive south to The Hague to visit Mauritshuis, the museum that houses Vermeer’s “The Girl With The Pearl Earring.” We took a leisurely drive down there looking for fields. You can just google “tulip fields Lisse” or “tulip fields North Holland” and you’ll be able to find a pin to drive towards. Areas that were recommended to us to look for fields: Leiden, Noordwijk, Haarlem, and the island of Goeree-Overflakee.
Mauritshuis was a beautiful, small museum. Super manageable for a shorter visit to stretch our legs, see a painting I’ve been enamoured with since my high school art history class, and grab some lunch (we found a great Indian restaurant about a 6 minute walk from the museum). Parking was easy and we were able to buy museum tickets at the door, no pre-booking needed.
After lunch, we still had some time before we needed to head back to Eindhoven for the airport so we decided to continue south to the island of Goeree-Overflakee. The drive was beautiful, through tulip fields and farm land. We had hoped our son would nap on the drive, but he was too excited playing I Spy and looking for cows.
The tulips fields down here were definitely way less crowded than those closer to Amsterdam. We enjoyed just driving around, stopped to take a few photos, and then continued on to Eindhoven. If you do visit tulip fields “in the wild,” so to speak, make sure to look for signs that may say something like “do not enter,” “do not cross this line,” etc. Basically, be respectful. Don’t damage the tulips and don’t traipse into private fields just for a photo.
We absolutely love this country and cannot wait to come back. One final tip: for breakfast, make sure to get yourself a piece of bread, some good butter (or peanut butter), and the Dutch chocolate sprinkles (called “chocoladehagel” and then the bread with sprinkles is called “hagelslag”). Your taste buds will thank you.