Holland – Keukenhof / Zaanse Schans / Volendam / Amsterdam

Hello world! Happy Saturday! While everyone is sleeping soundly, I am already on my way to Sentosa because I took part in Sentosa’s wacky new game show “Run Like Mad”! We had a semi finals round a few week back and we won! So today, we are back to the sunny island, competing against POWER98 DJs for the championship! You can watch the video of our semi finals here. Wish us good luck!

Anyway, it’s time for my travel post again! Last week I shared my travel photos in Frankfurt and Cologne, this week I am sharing HOLLAND! And this is my favourite for this trip because they have beautiful scenery and yummy waffles! We arrived at Holland just in time to visit Keukenhof! So happy lah! Keukenhof, also known as the Garden of Europe, is the world’s largest flower garden.

Keukenhof is situated near Lisse, Netherlands. It is accessible by bus from the train stations of Haarlem, Leiden and Schiphol. It is located in an area called the “Dune and Bulb Region” (Duin- en Bollenstreek).

It doesn’t open whole year round. This year, Keukenhof is only opened from 21 March to 20 May 2013. And we went on the second last day! The flowers has definitely all bloom, some of them withering soon. But it was still a very lovely sight!

According to the official website for the Keukenhof Park, approximately 7,000,000 (seven million) flower bulbs are planted annually in the park, which covers an area of 32 hectares.

In the past 64 years, over 50 million visitors from every corner of the globe have discovered the delights of Keukenhof. No wonder Keukenhof is regarded as the world’s most beautiful spring garden!

Too cold lah, so we bought a hot hot plate of tiny pancakes!

There is a maze for you to play!

One of the attraction is definitely the windmill, which is located right at the end of the garden. Be sure to take some photos there. There are also weekly changing flowershows and daily demonstrations about the art of flower arrangement.

Keukenhof 2014 will be open from March 20 until May 18. You can start planning for your trip now!

Another attraction we went is Zaanse Schans, a Dutch village dotted with windmills and cottages.

In Zaanse Schans, we get to see a wooden clog-making demonstration. There are many tales of Dutch people wearing wooden shoes. If you see a farmer in leather shoes, you will be more shocked! It is a very interesting concept to make a comfortable pair of well fitting, useful and inexpensive shoes out of two blocks of wood.

In the past, the clog is handles at least 25 times during mechanical production and it takes about a month to turn a block of wood into shoes. But with machines now, it only take 2 minutes to make a pair of clog. One tree on average can make 75 pairs.

We also get to try some cheese!

It is too beautiful and I just have to take more pictures. Holland! Windmill! We can’t see such beautiful scenery in Singapore la. And I was telling the boy, next time I want to retire at Holland. Just spend my days farming and making pancakes. He says he will be very bored.

And we also saw these Dutch people in their traditional costumes. Feel like I was transported back to the Shakespear moment!

Volendam is a popular tourist attraction in the Netherlands, well known for its old fishing boats and the traditional clothing. This fshing village still preserved its character. It was drizzling when we were there, so it kinda dampen our spirits. If you have the time, have a photo taken in historical costume – big skirts, funny hats and lots of props.

It goes without saying that being a fisher’s village – seafood is going to be a good choice. Must try their fish fillet here, it’s a specialty!

And of course we visited Amsterdam. As we have a very tight itinerary, I didn’t get to explore Amsterdam as much. Plus the weather was tooooo cold for me to handle. I only manage to eat at CAU, a mouth-watering Argentinian steak house. And not forgetting the french fries with mayonnaise. I wish I can stay here longer to explore the beautiful town.

So, I MUST COME BACK TO HOLLAND! I love this place so much and there are still so much I have not explored! Windmills, pancakes, tulips…Holland, you wait for me! I will come back!

Ok, that concludes my Holland part. For next week, I am still thinking if I should skip Belgium and jump direct to Paris. Let’s see how, signing off! 🙂