Blogs from North Holland, Netherlands, Europe - page 202

Europe » Netherlands » North Holland » Volendam September 23rd 2005

From Marken we drove to Volendam, Edam and finally Heemskerk. In typical Speedy Tour fashion, zooming through, snapping some pics.. moving on ! Finding the hotel in Heemskerk was a bit of a chore, but made it anyway. Nice place, next to and ING training school. ... read more

Landed !

Europe » Netherlands » North Holland » Amsterdam September 23rd 2005

Airport

SpeedyTours

Back in Europe after 4 years ! After coming back to Malaysia in 2001, we have not returned to Europe until now. Quite excited to be back. We have about 5 days to do Holland, so, Speedy Tours are back ! I arrived at 05:30am on KLM followed by Li-Shean at 07:15 on Singapore Airlines. Whilst waiting for her to land, I picked up the car from National Car Rentals. A nippy little Ford Fusion. So, armed with the free map, we are ready to hit the road.... read more

Them pretty houses in Marken

Europe » Netherlands » North Holland » Marken September 23rd 2005

Postcard Houses

SpeedyTours

From Haarlem we drove across to Marken. Trying to get onto the A10 was surprisingly difficult, having to make several loops around Zaandam (Zanstad)...... read more

Where to park in Haarlem ?

Europe » Netherlands » North Holland » Haarlem September 23rd 2005

Church

SpeedyTours

So, first stop, Haarlem. It was only a 20 minute drive from Schipol (everything is only 20 minutes drive away in Holland!). Once we got into town though, we drove around for a good 15 minutes looking for a place to park ! Working the street parking for the first time was a challenge too. With no coins in pocket, we 'had to' have breakfast first.... read more

Amsterdam...

Europe » Netherlands » North Holland » Amsterdam September 13th 2005

Rijks Museum

Ack_OZ

Travis So, can you do Amsterdam in a day? No.. not really, but we gave it a go... We went on a canal tour, saw the Rijks museum, the Van Gogh museum, a diamond honing place, walked through the red light district and saw Anne Frank's House. The red light disctrict wasn't quite as impressive as I had been expecting... but we also weren't there at night which apparently makes a difference. I think the most moving thing was Anne Frank's house... you could almost imagine being there at that time... One thing about Amsterdam and Holland... most touristy sites cost money, even the public toilets cost €0,50 ... All in all an interesting, and sensory overloading, day. We don't have a huge number of photos from Amsterdam because there is just too much there... you ... read more

Nederlands :)

Europe » Netherlands » North Holland » Haarlem September 12th 2005

Windmill in Haarlem

Ack_OZ

Amanda Country number 2. Okay so I think that maybe Holland has a lot of bikes too. I'm suffering from language confusion again but most people we have spoken to so far are able to understand our English. So far in our adventures in Holland we have seen lots of ol buildings, been inside a windmill, walked a lot, had train trips, been on a boat tour and looked at some more markets. We spent the rest of Saturday (our 31 hour day!) and most of Sunday recovering from jet lag and much confusion as to why it is light here at 8pm. Today we have just gotten back to Haarlem (a little west of Amsterdam) from a day trip to Rotterdam where we met up with a new friend from Holland and her fiance from ... read more

Even more lots and lots and lots of bikes

Centre Parks Amsterdam

Europe » Netherlands » North Holland » Amsterdam September 9th 2005

Gatwick

pg003

Weekend Works outing to Centre Parks... read more

Sin City....

Europe » Netherlands » North Holland » Amsterdam September 7th 2005

The Red Light District

Tav

We travelled past Cologne and crossed the border into the Netherlands. We passed canals and windmills. Apparently there are only about 1,000 working windmills left in Holland. The countryside is amazing, with green fields and crops and cows and people on tractors. There are a lot of dairy farms here, guess it goes to make the cheese they are famous for. All of the paddocks are divided by canals!! They say that Holland is 2.5m below water level and Amsterdam itself is 4.5m - hence the water everywhere on the sides of the roads and between houses etc. People around here cycle everywhere, it’s so well set up with bike tracks and if you don’t move they will run you over!! There are 6 million bikes in Holland and 600,000 of them are in Amsterdam. There ... read more

Red Lights, Bikes, Trams, Streetcars, Metrorail and Ferries

Europe » Netherlands » North Holland » Amsterdam September 5th 2005

Snikkidoodle

Wow the people in Amsterdam really know how to get around...literally and figuratively speaking. I've been here for 2 days now and am still in awe of how many modes of transportation there are here. When crossing the street you have to watch out for buses, trams, cars and crazy bicyclists...it's nuts. And of course there is the sex industry to boot. Went to the redlight district of Amsterdam last night and tonight (mostly to check in and see if the business is any different on the weekends as opposed to the weekdays, which it is not). The redlight is not exactly what I thought it would be. It is ctually a lot tamer than I expected, though I have been asked probably 20 times since I have been here if i wanted to buy some ... read more

Back from Amsterdam

Europe » Netherlands » North Holland » Amsterdam August 31st 2005

kamikazenaz

My third trip to the wonderful city. This time it was courtesy of my Mom, who had booked tickets for herself and Paul, and then added me on (without asking me whether I had time off from writing my dissertation, mind you). It was a totally new experience of Amsterdam, waking up early so that we could pack the most into the day. We stayed at the Hotel Arena, which is not exactly in the city centre, so it meant walking or hopping on the tram to get to the action spots. The Rijks Museum was great as usual, I managed to get some good photos because the weather was holding out well. We also managed a day trip by coach in to Den Haag (The Hague).... read more

Brief history of Netherlands

The Kingdom of the Netherlands was formed in 1815. In 1830 Belgium seceded and formed a separate kingdom. The Netherlands remained neutral in World War I, but suffered invasion and occupation by Germany in World War II. A modern, industrialized natio...more history

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