Off to (the) Netherlands!

On the (electric) road again.

The idea for another travel adventure came about nearly two years ago following an overheard conversation in a pub garden in Suffolk. A family were telling their friends about their recent trip around Asia with their young children and we thought, why aren’t we doing that too! With our daughter starting school in September, it felt like this was the perfect time to take advantage of not being tied to school holidays and go do some exploring.

Obviously travelling with a small child is quite different to two adults on their own, so I’m excited and a bit nervous to see how we all get on with it. That’s partly why we’ve chosen to stay in Europe, to minimise the culture shock, but another big factor was to see how easy it is to travel around in our electric vehicle. Stay tuned to find out!

The first country on our list is the Netherlands, as we have some friends who live in Alkmaar. To break up the journey there, we found a lovely Airbnb in a small, sleepy town called Terneuzen, about 20 minutes from the Belgian border. Our hosts couldn’t have been friendlier and treated us to a bottle of wine and a whole range of breakfast options which was very much appreciated.

Having been to the Netherlands a few times before, we’re always impressed by how friendly Dutch people are, how good their English is and how happy they are to speak it, and how child-friendly their restaurants are. Our dinner stop in Terneuzen excelled by providing a do-it-yourself ice cream topper stand which our daughter H absolutely loved!

The next day we decided to take the scenic route across South Holland, crossing multiple North Sea inlets either via tunnels or bridges and admiring the incredible flat landscape, old windmills and new wind turbines and miles upon miles of dikes. We took a slight detour just outside of Rotterdam to visit a housing estate in Spijkenisse, where they have built all the bridges depicted on the Euro bank notes, painted in the colour of the bank notes they can be found on. It was a lovely little estate with quaint houses and a good playground which served as a welcome lunch stop.

We continued up north on noticeably busier roads, skirting round Rotterdam, The Hague and Amsterdam on our way to Alkmaar. We even drove directly under Schiphol airport - it was quite an odd experience having a KLM plane cross over the top of your car!

We arrived in Alkmaar and met our friends at a cafe in a pretty park to the West of the city centre. Like many places in the Netherlands, Alkmaar is very bike friendly and it took a bit of getting used to the road network and how bikes get priority, for example on roundabouts. Our campsite, Camping Alkmaar, was on the edge of the city and was very well equipped, with clean and modern facilities. We pitched our tent, which H very much enjoyed, cooked some dinner and listened to the cheers as AZ Alkmaar beat FC Twente to secure a place in the Europa Conference League next season.

We spent the next day exploring Alkmaar’s old town, which is famous for its cheese making. We went round the Kaasmuseum, completing the scavenger hunt to win a badge and a pen. The museum had some excellent exhibits for children (and big kids alike!) and they even gave you a free cheese sample on entry so definitely worth a visit! The old town is very pretty, with quaint streets and little bridges over canals, very Dutch. There’s also a massive old windmill whose sails were actually turning when we walked past (turns out it’s rather windy in Alkmaar!)

After a quick lunch stop at Heeren van Sonoy (with one of the tastiest satay sauces I’ve ever had), we headed back to the same park as the previous day to check out the small farm there. We enjoyed seeing the llamas, peacocks, pigs, goats, rabbits and deer before returning to the campsite to soak up some sunshine, play football and cook dinner.

After a very windy night in our tent and not much sleep, we packed up and headed to Groningen as a lunch stop and charging point on the way to Hamburg. The drive included a very long bridge across the North of the Netherlands, although I was a bit disappointed to realise the sea view was actually obscured by a dike!

The centre of Groningen was also quite picturesque, with the old town surrounded by water. We found a tasty Italian restaurant followed by a good ice cream shop and just about managed to avoid the rain before jumping back in the car and heading towards the German border.