Keukenhof: The power of flowers

If you hear Holland, you think about tulips, and that’s what Keukenhof is all about. 45 Minutes by car from Amsterdam and you’re in a flower world. The smell, the atmosphere and the possibility to take so many good Instagram photos. What could you possibly need more?

The first weekend Keukenhof opened, we decided to drive to The Netherlands and see what it’s all about. At the roundabout where you need to take the turn to the park, 2 friendly, older men waved at us and showed with signals where we needed to go.

There is no real parking, you just park next to each other on grass, which is fine if it’s sunny but keep it in mind if it rains. Plenty of staff members show you in what row you should park.

Starting with a bit of a bummer, it’s not cheap. When I had to pay 42 euros for 2 entry tickets and a parking ticket, I checked twice that I didn’t select something wrong. If you buy your tickets online your entry ticket is 17 euros instead of 18 euros, but for some reason, I didn’t do this.

It’s not only expensive to get into the park, but also the food is crazy expensive for what you get. The tiniest cup of soup, which was basically just bouillon, was about 4 euros. A mini roll to go with it, 1 euro and 10 cents. But hey, if you’re hungry and you have no food from home, you pay it nonetheless.

Something else what was so strange to me is that the staff is so used to speaking English, that even if you talk to them in Dutch, they answer in English and that English is considered there as the most important language.

If you looked around you saw that at least 90% of all the people there were foreign and probably tourists from Amsterdam. The map of the park was only available in English, and for other texts (like in restaurants) there was in big letters the text in English, and in smaller letters the text in Dutch.

It felt so weird to be in my neighbouring country where they speak the same language, and feeling as if I’m abroad because Dutch is a bit hidden away.

Now to the main business, the park itself. As you can expect, filled with different kinds of flowers and colours. It’s quite big, and there are so many hidden places which you might have passed the first time, but it are those places which were for me the most special.

Don’t expect just boring little flowerbeds, they make works of art from the flowers by putting them in shapes, and by mixing them with structures.

At the mill (yes there is a mill, we’re in The Netherlands after all), you can take a boat tour through the surrounding tulip fields. I can’t remember how much it costs, but we thought it was too much and didn’t do it.

There are a few buildings, in which there are a sort of exhibition with flowers. Because we went quite early in the season, a lot of the flowers outside weren’t open yet so it was inside these buildings that we really got amazed.

For animal lovers, there are a few birdcages and a rabbit cage.

Some of the places in the park just scream ‘come take a picture, it will be amazing for Instagram’, and it is. I have never seen so many beautiful places to take photos, and never seen a place where it’s so normal to pose. Everywhere you see are people posing, so you shouldn’t be shy to take your camera and do it yourself.

It can be a challenge to be able to take a picture in your beloved spot because other people probably had the same idea. Patience is a keyword here.

Around the park are tulip fields, which are great for photos too, but there is no real possibility to go from the park directly into one of the fields. Also, remember to be very careful if you decide to go in those fields so you don’t destroy the flowers.

It’s not allowed to go inside the flower beds, and it breaks my heart when I see people doing it and crushing the flowers under their feet, all for a good photo.

Waited here for about 10 minutes until all the people were gone, but there only came more and more people so we left without a photo.

This place amazed me. Yes, it was an expensive day, but I loved it all. A camera roll filled with photos and more flowers in my memory than I have ever seen before.

I might even go again next year, but this time later in the season, and buying my tickets online.

Website Keukenhof: https://keukenhof.nl/en/

— Anke

#Daytrip #Keukenhof #TheNetherlands