Greetings from a lovely spring day in Mortsel, Belgium. I’m sitting outside enjoying the (finally warm spring, not freezing winter!) weather. I went on a nice walk with Greet to see the old fort system here. But that’s for another day…today’s post is about the Netherlands!
Cat-Sitting Begins
March 5, 2023
When we left off in the last entry, I’d just lead a workshop on flamenco percussion in De Hallen – a food hall in Amsterdam. After the last flamenco act ended, I thanked the organizers and walked towards the place where I was cat-sitting, a hip apartment near the center of the city. The cat owner was the niece of a friend of my dad, an unexpected opportunity and connection. On my way I stopped at a supermarket to pick up groceries for the next few days. I tried my best to understand what the cashier said but had to ask her to switch to English. Dang!
On my way back to the apartment I was continuously awestruck by all the bikes, so of course I took photos. I don’t think I’ll ever get used to it!
The rest of this day was very normal; I video-called my parents, then took advantage of the apartment’s HBO access to catch up on The Last of Us. Cordyceps won’t get me! Meanwhile Astorianna the cat…well, at least she semi-tolerated my presence. She is much different than Renée’s friendly floofs 😹
Bike Tour, Discovery
March 6, 2023
This started as a pretty mundane day; I fed Astorianna and worked all morning. In the afternoon, on the advice of my friend Lente, I registered for a tour with Baja Bikes. I bundled up for the cold, rainy weather and set out!
Bike Tour
If you go to Amsterdam and are physically comfortable/able, do a tour by bike. I enjoy free walking tours, but in Amsterdam it feels right to tour by bike (and I was already having FOMO not being able to join all the cyclists!). For 35€ I got bike access, complimentary hot drinks, and a 2.5-hour tour with four other participants. If you don’t have rain gear, they provide it too.
With such a small group, the tour guide was able to cater to our interests, so he added cycling history for me. Awesome! Here are facts I learned en route:
- Amsterdam is built almost at sea level, and there is a lot of water and peat soil under the buildings. Because of this, some of the buildings are beginning to tilt sideways!
- Many homes in Amsterdam are built in very narrow buildings with steep stairs. This is because buildings were taxed by size, so they were built to be very narrow to save some money.
- The narrow shape of the buildings makes it almost impossible to bring furniture up into some of these buildings, so many have very wide front windows. Then, on the front of the building, a sort of hook system allows residents to bring up furniture through the window instead of attempting the narrow stairs.
- Houseboats have become quite trendy in Amsterdam. It’s not uncommon to find a houseboat that costs €900,000!
- Some buildings in Amsterdam are historic, so they can only be renovated in very specific ways.
- Cycling history: There is a spot outside the Rijksmuseum that was once the shortest highway in the Netherlands. Cyclists were very opposed to this; it was not safe and many cyclists and children were injured in accidents with cars. To protest against this, over 9000 cyclists came with their bikes to that square outside the Rijksmuseum for a “die-in;” they laid down with their bikes and refused to get up until the city did something. It worked; that protest was an important moment in the cycling advocacy movement!
- De Pijp neighborhood – a working class neighborhood – is an important site for many reasons:
- In the 1960s-70s, the area was important in the squatter’s rights movement
- The two-wheeled cargo bike was invented there
- It’s one of the first auto-free/”car light” neighborhoods in Amsterdam
- To help make it “car light,” a parking garage was built under the canal to hold 600 cars, freeing up tons of street parking for cyclists.
- The Rijksmuseum is the only museum in the world you can cycle through. We rode direcyly through the middle! I haven’t figured out how to add videos on WordPress, but you can watch a video I took while cycling through it on Instagram @carolynventures
- There is a statue in Vondelpark donated by Picasso. It’s supposed to be a bird, but I agree with the local interpretation; it’s more like a fish. 😄
- There is a problem with bike theft in Amsterdam; homeless people find not-well-locked bikes and sell them for 10€, and drunk university students sometimes steal bikes to get home, then throw them in the canal. Twice a year, the city dredges the canal to remove bikes at the bottom, which are a problem for boats.
- My friend Renée told me a story about a homeless man approaching her and saying “Which bike would you like? Ten euros and I’ll cut the lock for you.” She wasn’t even trying to get a bike; he approached her out of the blue!
- Henry Hudson set sail for “the new world” from Amsterdam. Of course he didn’t have a great experience being trapped by ice in Hudson Bay and set adrift by mutineers, but we still have a river named after him.
- Amsterdam is where Anne Frank lived in hiding for two years. I got to hear the bell tower she mentions in her diary; it was just nearby where she was hiding, and she heard it ring every fifteen minutes for two years!
If you’re interested in a tour with Baja Bikes in Amsterdam, here is a link (I don’t have an affiliation, just think it’s a cool tour). It started POURING partway through the tour and even with the rain, it was still worthwhile. Definitely bring rain gear if you visit Amsterdam in March; I’ve been so grateful for my rain jacket and waterproof hiking pants on this trip.
Discovery
On my way back from the tour, I stopped in another grocery store to pick up more food, since I’d be staying in Amsterdam around a week. To my surprise, neither of the cards I was carrying – one debit, one credit – was accepted by the store!
If you’re an American, beware! Some places don’t take credit cards, and some only accept certain debit cards. I had Visa and Mastercard and neither worked in that particular grocery store (Albert Heijn, for those wondering). I’ve run into this problem a few times; I brought two debit cards and two credit cards to be well-prepared (never carry all at once, it’s in case I lose one), but there have been multiple instances where I’ve had to rely on cash. The Netherlands is aiming to be a cashless society in the next few decades, but from my experience you still need to carry euros if you only have American cards.
That’s all the news from that day; I rounded out my evening by catching up on more of The Last of Us and grading students. 🙂
Utrecht
March 7, 2023
Although I barely planned this Euro trip, it became apparent as my flight date drew nearer that I had many options and opportunities. For instance, my dad’s friend Lia, who I’ve met many times, grew up in Utrecht and spends half the year living just outside the city. Utrecht is a short train ride from Amsterdam, so I met her on a cold, snowy/rainy afternoon (as every day had been on my trip up to this point) for a tour (and just to catch up in general). Lia was a great guide; she told stories from her life growing up in Utrecht, as well as general information about the area and its history. Some highlights:
- The first official cycle path in the Netherlands was built in Utrecht, in 1885!
- According to the city’s website, Utrecht has the largest bicycle parking in the world, with space for 12,500 bicycles (I wonder if this is still accurate, with the huge bike parking areas recently built in Amsterdam).
- There is a big mall in Utrecht, and the canal runs directly under it. They created some cool architecture so that you can see the water from inside the mall.
- There are tons of gorgeous houses and other beautiful architecture with dates they were built still written on the buildings. I saw 1651 and thought that was the oldest, then I saw one from 1482!
- Wilhelm Röntgen, the inventor of the x-ray machine, lived in Utrecht for a period. In fact, Lia’s late husband lived in the same building Röntgen lived in during the 1800s.
- The only Dutch pope lived in Utrecht. If you remember from Krommenie, Utrecht is also home to the Catholic museum that is always interested in displaying Krommenie’s Old Catholic items.
Utrecht is certainly worth visiting, and I wish I had a bit more time to explore. It’s quieter than Amsterdam, a bit less touristy, and there are lots of gorgeous, quiet side streets to wander down. If you’re like me, you might also wander into a second-hand bike store and come out the owner of a new bicycle. Yes, that’s right, I bought a bicycle in Utrecht! I was hoping I might find one to ride to Belgium, but was only half-looking. This store had a nice one recently refurbished; the bike mechanic explained that an old e-bike had been given to him with a broken motor, so he re-built it to be a manual bike. It was a good price, so I took it home!
Lia and I spent the entire day in Utrecht. After I picked up my bike, we stopped for hot drinks at a bar with a great view of the canal. We also tried to visit the oldest store in Utrecht, and discovered that it has been turned into a museum! It was cool to explore the old general store items, and Lia shared memories of her parents selling similar items in their store. We ended the day with a lovely dinner at Taj Mahal, which she says is the best Indian food in town. The restaurant has been there for decades! It was delicious, so she might be right. Then we said goodbye and I caught the train back to Amsterdam. From the station, it was such a thrill to ride *my* bike back to the cat-sitting place!
Note: You need to pay extra to bring a full-sized bike on a train in the Netherlands, and you’re only allowed during non-peak hours. Plan ahead, or bring a folding bike to ride free 🙂
Amsterdamse Bos
March 8, 2023
As usual, I started the day with work, but I was itching to ride my bike! Renée recommended that I might enjoy Amsterdamse Bos (Amsterdam Forest), so in the afternoon I bundled up (it was a cold day once again) and set out for a 20-min ride to the forest. It was exhilarating to ride with the local cyclists and feel confident; like in New York City, I was soon ringing my bell and passing slower commuters on the left, moving to the right for those faster than me, and feeling great! Cycling in Amsterdam feels like cycling in Manhattan, except the exhilaration comes from a place of safety rather than the adrenaline of riding alongside buses and cars, not knowing when a pigeon or pedestrian might come into the bike lane, or when a parked car might open your door. The Dutch bike lanes are separated from cars and from the sidewalk, so there is never any chance of getting doored, and the only vehicles passing close are other cyclists.
I stopped along the way to admire some interesting architecture and scenery, then entered the forest and enjoyed a nice but cold hour of cycling. I stopped at an area called “The Lord of the Rings” for a rest and a snack, then pedaled home as quick as I could when it started snowing of nowhere. Not again! I packed clothes for this trip thinking I’d encounter weather typical for late winter/early spring, not the frigid cold of the middle of winter! Still, the trip was worth it, and I would definitely return to Amsterdam Forest another time to explore more.
March 9, 2023
This day was a bit of a disappointment. It snowed and rained almost nonstop, so I stayed indoors and worked. I was planning to go to a board game event for expats, but sadly it was canceled. Wouldn’t have been fun to travel in that weather, but it would have been cool to meet some expats for board games.
And Now For Some Misery…
March 10, 2023
Once I had a bike, I’d decided to leave the cat-sitting position early (the owner said it was okay; she had a neighbor who usually cares for the cat) and continue to Tilburg and my next host. The plan was to meet Lia once more before I traveled south, so I packed and cleaned up the place, then set out into the cold rain to start the journey. But….a snafu…
Because of all the rain and snow, I hadn’t checked whether my backpack would fit on the rack on this bicycle. So, standing in the rain, I tried every possible way I could think of to bungee the backpack. The weight wasn’t bad – I’d biked with that much and more on a bike before – but the size and angle of the bag did not fit well on the bike. I decided to ride the bike to the train station with the backpack on my back in a last attempt, but it was not great; it would not be healthy to ride a long way with that bag on my back. So…considering the weather, the bag, and how much time was already wasting away in the day, I made the disappointing decision to leave the bike behind. I’m coming back at the end of the trip, so I’ll get to use it, and with the price of renting a bike even for one day, it will still pay for itself.
So I’m leaving the bike behind…but where to leave it? Amsterdam Central Station has its amazing parking area inside for bikes, but you have to pay if you stay more than 24 hours. There is free parking outside the building, but there was a sign saying no bikes could be parked there mid-March through late-April. Dang. As the rain continued to pour down, I search and searched all around the station. Finally I found a promising spot, but then a sign said bikes can only stay there for 14 days maximum. I texted Lia “Will they really enforce this?” Her response: “Yep. This is the Netherlands 😎”
Okay…so not there. Then I found a spot with no sign – still raining, getting farther from the station – but when I texted Lia, she confirmed it might be meant for residents only. Not worth taking the chance for over a month. By now I’d been out in the rain for over an hour, running out of ideas. Then I realized the best answer might be to not park in Amsterdam at all, but to take the train 40 min. out of the way to Krommenie, to park at Renée’s station. I was getting very cold, so I rode back to the station and took the train, shivering my way there.
I walked out of the station at Krommenie directly into a full-blown snowstorm! I found a spot to park my bike and tried to get on the train again as quick as I could. Twenty very cold minutes later, I was finally on a train, appreciating the warmth. I began the trip to the Noord-Brabant province of southern Netherlands, where I was meeting my next host in Tilburg. But, as Renée warned me, Dutch trains break down in the snow, and sure enough, a train in front of mine did just that. At least the train had a fun toilet on board. I eventually made it to Tilburg, but from the time I left Amsterdam to the time I arrived at Tilburg, almost six hours had passed!
Once I got to Tilburg I had an awesome time with my host Niels, but I’ll save that for the next entry.
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