- First off, as has been mentioned numerous times in this blog, the Dutch are bike-crazy! We’ve never been involved in so many near misses in our lives, particularly in the larger cities. Amsterdam was the worst by far, but Gronigren in the north was also quite bad. We almost saw a fight break out between a pedestrian and a bike rider there. If you are walking, the cyclists view you as a simple impediment to ride around (or through if necessary)…there is no right-of-way except theirs. Bear this in mind.
- The bicycle helmet has not been discovered in the Netherlands. The prevailing attitude seems to be “I’m good at riding bikes, why should I wear a helmet?” You will see people riding on the back of a bike, riding side saddle on a bike rack, little kids wrapped around the front of an adult, little kids in carts attached the bike…and not a single helmet.
- A sidewalk is for bike parking, not for walking. Duh!
- In the larger cities of the Netherlands, a Coffee Shop is a store where you can buy and smoke the wacky weed. You know if you are near one, as the smell is permeating.
- Around 15,000 bikes are salvaged from the canals in Amsterdam every year. A lot of the bikes are thrown in by vandals, but quite a few end up in the canal due to heavy drinking or having visited a coffee shop recently.
- The Netherlands is a foodie paradise. A lot of their restaurants offer fixed price tasting menus, with anywhere from 4 to 7 courses, as well as the ubiquitous “amuse bouche”. They also love their “surprise” menus, where you get whatever the chef felt like making that day. Don’t get me wrong, this isn’t a complaint, but damn was it hard to not gain a shit-ton of weight on this trip!
- A lot of people refer to the Netherlands as Holland. This is incorrect. The Netherlands is made up of 12 provinces, and only 2 of these have the name Holland, South Holland and North Holland. The fact that the three largest cities, Amsterdam, The Hague and Rotterdam are in these two provinces is where the common terminology of Holland comes from.
- Credit cards don’t always work in the Netherlands. A lot of places, like grocery stores and certain gas stations, only accept a debit card. Make sure to have Euros on hand, although we visited several places that were “credit card only”. It got a little frustrating at times. It seems the Dutch expect everybody to have a debit card with a PIN number.
- There are more Teslas here than anywhere we have been in Europe, by far. They are almost as common as they are in California. I would say at least 10% of the cars on the road were Teslas. No sign of a Supercharger network though.
- Nearly everybody in the Netherlands speaks English. They have the highest rate of English speakers anywhere in Europe.
- We must look very Dutch, as we were always spoken to in Dutch when we first met somebody. A few people appeared to be asking for directions, and as soon as we spoke English they said “never mind”. This happened multiple times.
- If you like this painting by Vermeer, you are in luck!
This is “Girl with a Pearl Earring”, painted by Johannes Vermeer in 1665. It’s without a doubt the most popular painting in the Netherlands. You will find this painting on plates, mugs, spoons, napkins, jewelry, umbrellas, scarves, coasters, postcards, luggage…pretty much anything you can plaster it on! We saw it in every city we visited in the Netherlands. - The Dutch absolutely love the Royal family. Their biggest celebration of the year is “King’s Day” on April 27th, when everybody in the country wears orange, the national color. The celebratory day started in 1885. On August 31, 1885, “Princess Day” was celebrated for the first time for Princess Wilhemina’s 5th birthday. Princess Wilhelmina became Queen in 1891, and the day was changed to “Queens Day”. The name was changed once more (as well as the date) to “Kings Day” in 2014 in honor of the current King Willem-Alexander’s birthday. All of the stores were stocked with anything you can imagine in orange.
- Speaking of Wilhemina, every meal in the Netherlands ends with the check and Wilhemina mints. I ended up with mints in every pocket, and only found some of them after getting home.
- Lastly, much like Belgium, the Dutch don’t expect a tip, but very much appreciate getting one. If you do want to tip in a restaurant, the key is to tell the staff to add the tip before they present you with the credit card machine. They don’t have those obnoxious machines that shove the tip options in your face, which seem to be popping up everywhere in the US. As usual, thanks for reading!
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