Hague / Amsterdam

Day Two

Day Trip: Windmills, Delft, The Hague and Madurodam

Booked the Day Tour online using Viator website few weeks prior to our trip. The cost for this trip was USD 74.09 per person, which included entrance fees, transportation in air-conditioned coach but excluded lunch and drinks.

Had our lesson learned from the previous trip in Brussel that we nearly missed our departure point, we located the tour agency 'Lindbergh Travel' (left photo below) at Damrak the day before this trip. After breakfast at the hostel, we arrived at 9am at the agency. As we arrived early, I had the chance to grab some travel brochures for my reading (right photo below). The tour bus started on time after confirming the tour group.

Zaanse Schans Windmills

Zaanse Sachans is a neighbourhood of Zaandam, north of Amsterdam. It is famous for its collection of well-preserved windmills (photos below), and thus one of the popular tourist attractions in the Netherlands.

There used to be over 10,000 windmills spread across the Netherlands, but now there are only 991 windmills remained (397 drainage mills and 594 industrial and corn mills). Windmills are known worldwide as an iconic symbol of Dutch culture. Many still remain fully functional and interestingly each mill had been given a name.

Name of the windmills from left to right: Het Jonge Schaap (the Young Sheep), De Kat (the Cat) and De Zoeker (the Seeker) shown in the photo below.

Besides windmills, there are also several museums in Zaanse Schans.

Klompenmakerij

Klompenmakerij (left photo below) is a small workshop and museum at Zaanse Schans on clog wooden shoe making. Traditional clogs were so popular that at the end of the 19th century special machines were introduced to quickly process wooden blocks, hollow them and give the footwear the right form. Admission is free to the museum.

Zaans Museum

Zaans Museum (right photo below) is a museum at Zaanse Schans opened in 1998 to preserve and protect the heritage of the Zaan area. Admission cost EUR 15 and daily opening hours from 1000 to 1700 hours. Due to our tight schedule of the day trip we didn’t visit this museum.

Volendam Harbor

Volendam is located on the mouth of IJsselmeer lake. Used to be a fishing village, now Volendam is a popular tourist attraction in the Netherlands. Fishing and other boats are busy coming and going in the small harbor (left photo below). Old houses in this town seems to be hardly touched over time (right photo below).

A variety of cosy cafés and restaurants, along with outdoor seafood vendors would definitely satisfy the tastebuds of visitors. It was almost lunch time by the time we reached Volendam Harbor. Decided to try hollandse poffertjes or Dutch Mini Pancakes from the friendly owner (left photo below). These traditional Dutch Pancakes were topped with melted butter and powdered sugar (right photo below). I got myself a small set at EUR 2.50.

Fried seafoods were equally tempting (photos below).

Shared a fried seafood mix (left photo below) with my colleague at EUR 5 per portion. This small portion surely can’t fulfill my hunger, thus I got 'gebakken spiering' or fried smelt (right photo below) at EUR 2.50.

Volendam-Marken Express

After the free time at Volendam, we then gathered at the Volendam-Marken Express port (left photo below). Marken Express is a fleet of ferries (right photo below) that carry passengers to and from the peninsula of Marken. Ferries depart from Volendam Harbour every 30 to 45-minutes. After a journey of approximately 30 minutes boat ride, we reached the Peninsula of Marken.

Peninsula of Marken

Marken is a village in the Waterland and Zaan region, 20-minutes drive north of Amsterdam. It used to be an island but now connected to the mainland by a causeway.

Upon arrival, every visitor is greeted by a beautiful view of fishing boats (left photo below) and green wooden houses (right photo below) alongside the harbor. The houses are built on stilts or poles, or clustered on the hills so provide protection from fluctuating tides.

Klompenmakerij Marken

Klompenmakerij Marken (left photo below) is another wooden shoe factory on the Peninsula of Marken where clog making both with machine or hand-made can be watched live (right photo below).

There are many wooden shoes available to try on for size (left photo below) and racks of ready-made shoes to buy. These shoes are perfect for working in the garden because they are water resistant or can be used as doorway shoe before entering the house. There are miniature versions of these wooden shoes which are perfect gifts as souvenirs (right photo below).

Admission to Klompenmakerij Marken is free and opens daily.

After the tour, we were then coach back to the tour agency 'Lindbergh Travel' where we had to join another half-day tour group.

De Delftse Pauw

De Delftse Pauw (left photo below) is a pottery factory from the 17th century located in the city Delft, south of Amsterdam. It was one of the few pottery factories which carry on the tradition of hand-painted Delftware. During the guided tour, visitors were showed on the production process on how pottery was made and painted (right photo below).

The salesroom of the factory was full of beautiful collection of blue and white potteries as well as the popular multicolored potteries (photos below).

✍ Update:
De Delftse Pauw was taken over by Heinen Delft Blauw on 01 July 2018, but was declared bankrupt in September 2020 and its location permanently closed from 01 September 2021.

Noordeinde Palace

Noordeinde Palace or Paleis Noordeinde in Dutch (left photo below) is one of the three palaces of the Dutch Royal Family located in the Hague, south of Amsterdam. It has been a palace of the Royal House since 1609 and the Dutch monarch still uses it as a working palace today. In front of the palace stood the horse statue of Willem van Oranje (right photo below), known as William of Orange, who was the main leader of the Dutch revolt against the Spanish that set off the Eighty Years War.

Visitor can only take pictures from the street as the palace itself is not open to the public.

Peace Palace

Peace Palace or Vredespaleis in Dutch (photos below), is an international law administrative building in the Hague. It houses the following organizations:

• International Court of Justice (which is the principle judicial body of the United Nations)
• Permanent Court of Arbitration
• the Hague Academy of International Law
• Peace Palace Library

The Palace was officially opened on 28 August 1913 and had gained its world position for peace, justice and arbitrage.

Madurodam

Our last attraction in our day trip was Madurodam (photos below). It is a miniature park in the Scheveningen district of the Hague, south of Amsterdam.

This park is home to a range of 1:25 scale model replicas of famous Dutch landmarks, historical cities and large developments (left photo below). There was also a statue of the famous holland boy Hans Brinker who plugged a leaking dike using his finger whole night to keep water out that threatened to flood the country. This was based on the famous novel 'the Silver Skates' (right photo below).

A replica of Amsterdam Airport Schiphol was on display (left photo below). Interestingly there was a model of Singapore Airline A380 which overshadowed the rest of other airlines in terms of its size (right photo below).

Famous Dutch landmarks were also modelled, such as the Royal Palace of Amsterdam (left photo below), Nieuwe Kerk (right photo below), the Peace Palace (bottom left photo) and scene of Queen arriving at Dutch Parliament buildings 'Het Binnenhof' (bottom right photo).

Historical City Centers were also modeled and displayed (photos below).

Admission cost was EUR 14.50 and opening hours from 1100 to 1700 hours, with various exceptions throughout the year. As we joined the day tour, so admission fee to this park was already included in the package.

Aneka Rasa Restaurant

Highly recommended by our colleagues who had been to Amsterdam, we then decided to have dinner at this Indonesian restaurant Aneka Rasa (left photo below). The restaurant was decorated with a tropical ambience (right photo below).

We ordered 'Rijsttafel Aneka' which cost EUR 19.80 per person. Rijsttafel is a Dutch word which translate as 'rice table' similar to Nasi Padang but more extravagant.

Crackers was first served then followed by 12 side dishes (left to right photos below): "Sate Ayam", "Sambal Goreng Buncis", "Sambal Goreng Telor", "Daging Rendang", "Ayam Besengek", "Sayur Lodeh", "Gado-Gado", "Anak Sapi Kecap", "Sambal Goreng Kentang", "Serundeng", "Acar" and "Pisang Goreng", together with Steamed and Fried Rice (right bottom photo).

It is indeed authentic to Indonesian dishes and definitely an Asian food fix for us.


Day Three

Van Gogh Museum

Visited Van Gogh Museum (photos below) as first itinerary on our third day. This is an art museum dedicated to the works of Vincent Van Gogh and it is located in the Museum Square close to Rijksmuseum and Concertgebouw.

The more famous paintings include 'Sunflowers - repetition January 1889' (left photo below) and 'Self-Portrait with Grey Felt Hat' (right photo below).

The museum now contains the largest collection of Van Gogh's works in the world, including 200 paintings, 400 drawings and 700 letters. Admission fee cost EUR 11.73 using iAmsterdam City Card. Opening hours from 1000 to 1700 hours (Tues to Sun), with slight extension during the summer.

Concertgebouw

The Royal Concertgebouw or Koninklijk Concertgebouw in Dutch (photos below) is a concert hall in Amsterdam. Its superb acoustics place it among the finest concert halls in the world, along with Boston's Symphony Hall and the Musikverein in Vienna. The Royal Concertgebouw celebrated its 100th anniversary in 1988.

Rijksmuseum

The Rijksmuseum or the National Museum (photos below), is a Dutch national museum dedicated to arts and history in Amsterdam. The museum had on display 8,000 objects of art and history, from their total collection of 1 million objects from the years 1200 till 2000, among which are some masterpieces by Rembrandt, Frans Hals and Johannes Vermeer.

Wing Kee Chinese Restaurant

Back to the same restaurant for lunch again. Ordered a 'Beef fried hor fun' (left photo below) as my main dish and we shared a plate of 'Roasted chicken' (right photo below). Total price was EUR 15.25 per person after dividing the bill.

After lunch, we claimed our luggage at the hostel locker and then took train from Amsterdam Centraal to Amsterdam Airport.

Reached Genèva Airport at 1905 hours. With this, it ended our short weekend trip to Amsterdam.