The Netherlands is a tiny country, just 252 km long and approximately 164 km wide and a population of 70 million.
The Netherlands is a very flat country with more than a quarter of its land surface lying below sea level. Added to this landform fact, 50% of its land lies less than one metre above sea level. Its main airport lies 4.5 metres below sea level and is an excellent example of the engineering feats achieved by the Dutch through their ingenious windmill-powered system of canals and dykes which has made it possible to create more land surface through the clever drainage of waterways and swamplands.
Our ship did not go into Amsterdam because the Netherlands government is trying to reduce the number of cars in this city and has raised the cost of portage for ships so hefty a charge that Princess decided to dock at the Port Imujiden and bused passengers free of charge into Amsterdam which is about 20 km away. We however, booked a tour to Haarlem which is only about 25 kilometres from the port. Port Imujiden is a fairly busy port but we had booked a tour to Haarlem which is about 20 km from the port because we'd been to Amsterdam before and spent 5 days exploring that very busy city, filled with canals, dykes , windmills and bicycles galore. We'd really enjoyed visiting the Van Gogh Gallery in Amsterdam at the time. It has an extensive informative display of Van Gogh's works which trace his early art works and described his life story through a chronological journey-display of the evolution of his art styles right up to his death in 1890. During that visit we also visited Ann Franks House and Museum and were reminded how this young Jewish girl had lived during the dark years of Hitler's regime against the Jews across Europe in the 1940's.
This year we took a tour of the city of Haarlem - a mini Amsterdam with canals, dykes , windmills and bicycles but without the crowds and heavy traffic. We left about 8am by coach for Haarlem which was about a 30 minute trip. On the way we passed fields of grasslands with crops, small sheep farms and dairy herds. The Netherlands is famous for its cheeses, yoghurt and milk products. Amongst the farmlands clumps of forest trees were interspersed with windmills and some modern wind-farm operations. We passed the airport which was once a water filled marshland but now having been drained and filled with a solid base serves as an up to date airport.
Our plans for today were to wander through the old township of Haarlem, visit the home where Corrie Ten Boom lived (it is now a museum), lunch on some local fare, go for a canal cruise around Haarlem and have a tour of a working windmill.
It is to be a relaxed day for us as we have plenty of time to explore Haarlem and complete all the activities we have planned to do. The coach dropped those planning to explore Haarlem, at a meeting up point where we'd rejoin the coach for our return trip to the Sea Princess later in the day. The rest of the passengers who stayed aboard the coach were continuing on to Amsterdam to spent 5 hours exploring this large and very busy city. Our biggest worry was not being run down by bicycles of all sizes and configurations as most people travel around Haarlem by bicycle but we were on foot.
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