One day I was going about my daily business of watching Netflix for hours on end when I remembered something: the tulips in Holland are a thing and I must see them. I was already going to Prague, so I hit up my Delta Skymiles account and booked a ticket with points from Prague to Amsterdam and started researching where to go to see the rows of tulips.
There’s a lot of tulip farms and places to go around Amsterdam, but the thing that came up most in my searches was Keukenhof, one of the world’s largest flower gardens. I bought my ticket in advance as is advised, and was ready to go!
My ticket for Keukenhof also included buses to and from the gardens, but being a person with anxiety about odd things, I decided to book a taxi to take me there in the morning to beat the crowds, and I’d figure out the bus situation later. It’s about a 25 minute car ride from Amsterdam (not 50 minutes like the taxi site said to allow) so I arrived at 7:30am… Keukenhof opens at 8:00. Though at first annoyed that I had to stand around outside in the cold for 30 minutes, this turned out to be AWESOME. I was about the 5th person to enter the gardens and it’s so big that I had a lot of the spaces to myself for a while. Look at this place!
You might be thinking, “huh, I thought you wanted to see the fields of tulips, not a garden?” Well, don’t you worry, Keukenhof is also surrounded by tulip fields, so you can get your fill of the rows of colorful tulips as well. I believe you can also rent bikes outside the garden to explore the tulip fields that way if you want.
Keukenhof is HUGE. I was there for about 2.5 hours and I’m not sure if I saw it all. There’s a few cafes and shops around the gardens as well so you can get your fill on snacks and souvenirs. If you like flowers, this place is a must.
By the time I left around 10:30 or 11:00, this place was PACKED and my worst nightmare, SCHOOL GROUPS, were arriving right as I left. So if you’re going to go to Keukenhof, do yourself a favor and get there right when they open, its worth the early wake up. I took the bus to get back to Amsterdam. There were a few options, but I took the one that went to the airport and just got the train to Amsterdam Centraal from there.
I stayed in Rembrandt Square at Hotel Atlanta and this was a great location, so I could easily explore the rest of the city. I’ve been to Amsterdam before, so I wasn’t in a big hurry to go to any museums or anything. I won’t lie, other than the tulips, my main motivation for this trip was frites and stroopwafel. So the couple days I had in the city, I ate frites, found stroopwafel, and just wandered up and down the canals. I wasn’t in a museum mood this trip, so I skipped those. If you are into museums, make sure you get the I Amsterdam card. It covers entry to most museums (and lets you book specific times for the Van Gogh Museum) and covers your transport within the city.
When it comes to frites, you have to get Mannekenpis. This is right near Amsterdam Centraal and never has dipping a fry in glorified mayonnaise (fritesauce) tasted so good. There’s tons of sauce options, but I always go with the fritesauce, because I’m afraid of food related change. If it ain’t broke… I went there for the first time in 2010 and honestly have not stopped thinking about the frites since, so naturally this was my lunch 2 days in a row.
As I was wandering around wondering when a stroopwafel would present itself, I walked past a tiny place and there they were in the window! They were being made fresh to order and OH. MY. GOD. These live up to the hype I’ve had in my mind ever since I saw them made on The Great British Bake Off. I could probably eat this thing every day.
Between stuffing my face with frites, I managed to see quite a few of the canals via aimless wandering. Last time I was in Amsterdam, there was a straight up blizzard. You know how much I love snow, but that was kind of a buzzkill, so I was happy to see the canals in spring time without snow seeping into the newly formed hole in the sole of my boot.
Yes, I will take a canal house as a vacation home, thanks for asking.
I moved to a hotel by the airport for the last night I was there and in classic me style, I decided to just be lazy and eat dinner and breakfast at the hotel before heading to the airport for my flight. The mini Dutch pancakes in bed were a winner.
It should also be noted that at some point during my wanderings I ended up in one of the many cheese stores in Amsterdam. Then after that, I went in another cheese store. I don’t know what happened in there but I spent about €50 on cheese. I regret nothing. So much so that I bought EVEN MORE cheese at the airport. Cheese is life. I won’t apologize, or share my cheese, so don’t ask.
G2G eat some cheese. Bye.
tothandcotravels.com 
Wow, such beautiful photos! Keukenhof looks so pretty – I hope to get there one day
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