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How to experience Holland's tulip fields by bike
21.03.2024 - 17:43 / lonelyplanet.com
Brian Healy on the best way to see the splendor of Holland’s tulips: on two wheels.
How could I say no to tulips?
My mother Joyce – an avid cyclist, gardener and aficionado of Dutch culture – had for years dreamed of a jaunt through the fields of South Holland’s Bollenstreek (“bulb region”) in April, when the entire country is in bloom.
We put together an independent itinerary to see the best of this compact region by bike. Four days, two nights each in two cities, à la carte rentals by the day. Lunches at villages along the way, with plenty of snacks in our backpacks for on-the-go refueling. And – most of all – lots and lots of biking, perhaps 20 miles per day. While my mother and I both stay relatively fit, we’re not intense athletes – yet neither of us was worried about covering some distance on Holland’s ultra-flat terrain.
I set off expecting an idyllic yet somewhat kitschy tour of tourist-friendly Holland, that storybook place filled with windmills and pigtailed maidens in wooden shoes. What I got was a surprisingly athletic few days of pedaling, a priceless bonding experience and the mind-clearing exhilaration that comes from extended time on a bicycle.
Oh, and did I mention the tulips? I saw a lot of those, too.
After testing our cycling chops during a few days on the streets of Amsterdam, we headed south on the 45-minute Intercity train ride (€12) to tulip country. From the windows of our double-decker carriage, we got a tantalizing glimpse of fields with rows of bright pink, orange, red and white forming almost kaleidoscopic patterns as the train zoomed by.
Our first destination: Leiden, a truly delightful city that has all the 17th-century buildings, glittering canals and atmospheric charm of the capital, without the throngs. (That is, if you don’t count the thousands of local university students who materialize for alfresco happy hour each night.) Without reserving ahead of time, we easily rented heavy bikes for two days by walking into a local cycling shop, then pedaled them around the small city to explore, run errands and do our best to pass for Dutch. As we continually pulled over to check Google Maps on our phones, we did not succeed.
A note about our kit: though my mother (who’s 30 years older than I am) takes her cycling much more seriously than I do, she left her high-tech gear at home. We stuck with civilian clothes and three-speed rentals for our trip, opting for solidity and style over sleekness. One arguably reckless way we tried to fit in? By forgoing helmets, which I didn’t see a single cyclist wearing our entire time in Holland.
The next morning, we set out from Leiden toward Lisse, 10 miles away, where we had tickets to see the famous Keukenhof Gardens. On dedicated, fully
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