The tulips

It was tempting to laze around the morning after an extremely long day, but we couldn’t let Queen’s Day keep us from the main motivation behind this trip: tulips. The weather forecast was just as uninspiring as our sore calve muscles, but we packed up some raingear and headed west.

I had decided to start our tulip tour in Haarlem. It's the capital of the province of Noord-Holland, and in addition it is the center of a large bulb-growing region. We were scarcely outside of town limits when we saw the first flashes of color. Bulbs have been grown in this region for hundreds of years, as the sandy, well-drained soils are conducive to their growth and the tulips thrive in climates with long, cool springs and dry summers.

It was once we got closer to Lisse that we really saw the bulb growing fields in all their glory. The stems are cut off soon after blossoming in order to strengthen the bulb which will then be sold for planting in the autumn. Our timing was perfect; we might have even been on the tail-end of the season, as we could see fields where the bulbs had already been harvested.

Today bulbs cover about 36,000 acres in the Netherlands, and more than a half billion euros’ worth of bulbs are exported all over the world each year.

The second half of the day was spent at the Keukenhof gardens, which very well may be the most famous gardens in the world. What started as an exhibition site for a group of bulb growers has developed into a national showcase that attracts over 900,000 visitors a year. Open only March 22^nd to May 20^th this year, but with three layers of bulbs planted on top of one another, it's guaranteed something is blooming in every bed the whole time.

Fountains, ponds, themed gardens and art are scattered throughout, and the Groningen windmill on the north edge has a good view of the surrounding bulb fields.

The gardens were extraordinarily beautiful, and the cost of entry reasonable (at €14.50), but it was crowded. Being that it was considered the peak of tulip season, the day after Queen’s Day and it wasn’t raining (although it was overcast and cold the entire day), I thought it understandable that it was hard to get a picture without other visitors in it. Although, we did discover that the park really emptied out about ½ an hour before closing time (which is 1930), and nobody was actively herding us out even when the park was officially closed. I believe this is also when the park was at its most beautiful, and we really lucked out when the sun poked out from behind the clouds as it was setting. The atmosphere is probably similar right when the gardens open at 8am with fewer people and the morning light.

Our loop back home led us past a pancake house just in time for dinner. That evening we arrived at the hotel late, but extremely satisfied with a lovely day spent in the flower fields. It was bedtime for everyone, as the following day we hoped to explore Amsterdam without the distraction of a million people celebrating the Queen's birthday.