Dutch_Travelgirl

This year the Royal family will be joining the festivities in Emmen, in the northeastern part of our country. There are no fireworks at Kingsday. Yes, it is our national holiday, but we don’t celebrate it the same way as the USA celebrates their national holiday with parades and fireworks. Read up on how we do celebrate it here; https://www.holland.com/global/tourism/getting-around/information/the-royal-family/kings-day-in-holland.htm https://www.iamexpat.nl/lifestyle/expat-events-festivals/kings-day If your father wants to see the festivities from his hotel room window, you would need to book him a hotel in central Rotterdam.

If you want to go from Amsterdam to Bruges, you will need to switch trains in Antwerp or Brussels. There are 2 types of trains from Amsterdam to Antwerp and Brussels; 1) highspeed train Thalys/Eurostar; tickets are tied to a specific train on a specific time and day and you are assigned a seat. 2) Regular intercity trains; tickets are not tied to a specific train only to a specific day. This means you can take any train from Amsterdam to Antwerp or Brussels on that particular day. Trains have free seating. Regardless of which train you took, you will need to switch trains in either Antwerp or Brussels. Here you only have 1 option; a regular domestic train. Again, tickets are not tied to a specific train only to a specific train. You can take any train towards Bruges and there is free seating. Even though you have to switch trains, you can book your entire train trip in 1 booking. You can use the website of the Dutch national railway company for international train travel https://www.nsinternational.com/en Or you can use the equivalent of the Belgian national railway company https://www.b-europe.com/EN

You keep your luggage with you at all times. Some trains have a luggage rack, if not you just keep it beside you. On trains to and from Schiphol lots of people have luggage with them, it really isn’t a big deal.

There still seems to be a lot of misinformation and misunderstanding. Amsterdam is not going to be closing its cruise port. The city council has decided to speed up the plans to move the cruise terminal out of the city center towards the harbour. So they’re planning to move the terminal not close it. And since the building process for the new terminal hasn’t even started yet, this move won’t happen for many many years.

A few corrections/nuances from a local because the Guardian article is missing some details which seems to have lead to misinterpretations of what was actually decided; the city council has not voted to shut down the cruise terminal and it doesn’t take effect immediately. For some time now there is a debate going on in Amsterdam about how to control the huge number of tourists that visit the city each year. On top of that there is increasing awareness about the huge air pollution caused by ocean cruise ships. As you may know, their engines still need to run, at a lower level, to generate the electricity needed to power all systems on board. For years, there has been talk in Amsterdam about moving the cruise terminal to a place outside the city. In 2016 for instance, the city already decided to move the cruise terminal to somewhere more near the harbor, but concrete action was never taken. The city did reduce the number of ocean cruise ships that are allowed to dock at the Amsterdam cruise terminal to a maximum of 190 ocean cruise ships per year. Yesterday, the city council has decided to speed up the process of moving the cruise terminal for sea cruises. In other words; it’s time we stop talking about it and start taking action. That’s it. So there is no immediate shut down of the cruise terminal in Amsterdam. And until the new cruise terminal is ready, which won’t be for many many years, ocean cruise ships can still come to Amsterdam and dock in the Cruise Terminal.

You were already given the address of the cruise terminal where you’re ship will dock. Using Google Maps you can easily check for yourself whether or not you’re up to walking from there to the Jewish district and/or the museum district. For me it would definitely be doable, but I’m not you. Public transport in Amsterdam has been cashless for years, you’ll need a debit or credit card to pay.

There seems to be some confusion here about the various shuttle busses at the port of Zeebrugge. The port of Zeebrugge where the cruise ships dock is a working port where large container ships etc also dock. It’s not a dedicated cruise port. For safety reasons it’s not allowed for cruise ship passengers to make their own way from the ship’s berth to the cruise terminal building. With containers stacked high, trucks etc etc, it’s too dangerous to walk around the port. Therefore the port of Zeebrugge offers free shuttle busses from the location where the ship is docked to the cruise terminal building. This is the same principle as when your flight arrives at a remote stand without an airbridge. In many airports, you aren’t allowed to walk from this remote stand to the terminal building, but you’re bussed there. So in Zeebrugge you’re bussed to the cruise terminal building. Once there, there are several options to get to Brugge; take a paid shuttle bus or make your way to the train station of Blankenberge and train to Brugge.

The HOHO can work well in other cities, but not in Amsterdam. The streets in the most beautiful part of Amsterdam, the historical city center, are way too narrow for the HOHO busses. The busses therefore have to circle around the city center rather than drive through it. The hoho canal boat leaves very infrequently, so it isn’t helpful either. The best way to explore Amsterdam is to walk through it, combined with a regular non-Hoho canal cruise.

I think you must have misunderstood. There is no 3-day pass that costs €18 that covers all trains, trams etc in the Amsterdam area. If you stay at the airport, want to use the train and want to have a 3-day pass, your only option is the 3-day Amsterdam Travel ticket which costs €30 or the 3-day Amsterdam &Region Travel Ticket which costs €40,50.

Unless you can be off the ship at 6:30 am at the latest, I’m afraid you’ll need a car service that can travel back in time. Assuming you’re flying to the US and with luggage, you’ll need to be at the airport 3 hours before departure. At 6:30 it will take a car around 1 hour to get to Schiphol from Rotterdam cruise terminal, so that should be okay. But if your disembarkation time is after 7:00 there is a very slim chance you’ll make your flight.

As long as you each have your very own card, it doesn’t matter that they are charged to the same account. So yes, this will work. You don’t need a PIN.

No, the quote was in reference to each person needing to have their own credit or debit card if you want to use your credit or debit card to tap in and out.

I’m not sure how you researched this online, but there are lots of mentions of this new payment method online. For instance the official website that explains all you need to know; https://www.ovpay.nl/en Or the Dutch Tourism website https://www.holland.com/global/tourism/getting-around/information/public-transport/ov-chip-card-5.htm Or this expat website; https://www.iamexpat.nl/expat-info/dutch-expat-news/ovpay-ns-check-dutch-trains-your-phone-or-debit-card

There are plenty of direct Thalys trains from Amsterdam to Paris on June 17, so I don’t understand why you think you need to switch trains in Brussels. The main thing to note for the OP @donandmelissa who started this topic is that the direct trains from the Netherlands to Paris are NOT discontinued.

Where did you get this information from??? There are still direct Thalys trains from Amsterdam to Paris after next month. Could it be you were looking at a specific date with track works?

Trains to Paris will operate normally, so you don’t have to stay in Rotterdam for a day let alone 2. But if you want to join in the festivities, you can of course do so!

The time of day definitely is a factor. Long haul flights tend to arrive at the airport in the morning and this impacts the lines at immigration. If several other planes landed just in front of yours, it can be a long wait of up to 60 minutes. There are lots of restrooms at Schiphol Airport, but not in the immediate area of passport control. So you might consider using the restrooms first before joining the line. If you’re lucky there are no lines and you breeze thru, but you better be prepared if you’re not so lucky.

It’s a bit confusing and not very good forum etiquette that this thread about public transport tickets in Amsterdam now contains a totally unrelated question from another poster about a taxi ride from hotel Nadia to the airport. @victory2020 It’s best that you start your own thread, as your question has nothing to do with the original post.

Since earlier this year, you can use your debit or credit card to pay for public transport in Amsterdam and elsewhere in the Netherlands. If you take the tram or bus, you tap your credit card at the reader and you do this again when you arrive at your destination and leave the tram/bus. The system will then know the distance you traveled and will charge the correct fare to your card. The same thing when you use trains and subway/metro, but then the card readers are at the entrance and exits of the train and metro stations. if you don’t plan to take a lot of tram trips, tapping in and out with your credit card will be cheaper than a day pass.

The naming of the establishments is a bit odd and can cause confusion. The places that sell weed are called “coffeeshops” (1 word, no space). The usually have names that don’t include the word coffee, like Amnesia, The Bulldog, Grey Area etc etc. The windows of coffeeshops are usually covered, so you can’t see inside, although some do have an outdoor terrace. Places that don’t sell weed, but do sell coffee, tea, pastries etc are called coffee shops (with a space!), coffee bars, coffee houses etc etc. They have names that include the word coffee or a word that relates to coffee, like for instance The Coffeecompany, Bagels and Beans, Coffee and Cake, Good Beans. Looking in from the outside it’s very clear that they sell coffee, pastries etc. It may seem confusing now, but once you get here it will be very obvious which establishment sells what.

I’m not sure how it’s relevant where I would stay, because I’m not you. What matters is what you look for in a hotel, what you plan to do while in Amsterdam etc etc

Amsterdam doesn’t end at the U. The Marriott is in a very convenient location, especially if you want to visit the museums like Rijksmuseum and Van Gogh museum. The wonderful Vondelpark is also close by and at the same time the Canal Zone is very close by. To give you some reference; it’s only a 20 minute walk from the W Amsterdam to the Marriott Hotel.

I’m sorry to say, but this is incorrect. Cork is in Ireland and while Ireland is indeed an EU member, they are not a Schengen member state. There is no such things as immigration into the EU, there is only immigration into the Schengen Zone. If you travel from Ireland to the Netherlands, you will travel from a non-Schengen country to a Schengen member and you will need to go thru immigration. Once you’re in the Schengen Zone, you can travel across borders without immigration as long as you stay with the Schengen zone. Confusing the EU with the Schengen Area is a common mistake. Especially since some EU countries aren’t Schengen countries, but also some Schengen countries aren’t in the EU. See this site that explains the difference between EU and Schengen; https://visaguide.world/europe/eu-vs-schengen/

@cpl100; you’re asking me which one I would choose, but I’m afraid it’s impossible for me to pick one over the other. If I myself were to stay in a city like Amsterdam I would want to stay in a hotel with a more local feel than a hotel that’s part of a USA-based hotel chain. I’m sure both the Marriott and the Hilton are great hotels, with good rooms and great hospitality service, but they’re just not where I myself would ever consider staying in outside of the USA. If you’re making me pick one based on location, it would be the Marriott. The location of the Marriott is close to perfect for a first time visitor to Amsterdam. If I would apply my own criteria, I would pick the Hilton. The hotel has a very interesting history (John Lennon/Yoko Ono, Herman Brood) and the neighborhood has a more local feel.

It’s absolutely impossible to say anything meaningful at all about how high or low water levels will be. The water levels in the Netherlands are the result of a very complicated process and depend on lots of different variables. It’s so much more complex than “lots of rain = high water levels” and “no rain = low water levels”.