Amsterdam to Paris with a Campervan
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For some reason, it was just easier to book a Paris-Frankfurt train ticket and start the journey from there. On that trip, our ride/home will be a Sporty van from Indie Campers. The perfect size to drive the narrow coastal road in The Netherlands and easily park in cities.
Let’s just hop on the fun and go straight away from Frankfurt to Amsterdam by the famous German highway in one ride. Once in Amsterdam, you will find plenty of places to park overnight without any issue and then either take a free ferry or a tram to reach the hyper center.
Not going to describe the capital nightlife and activities as our goal was to reach one of the few areas in The Netherlands where you will only see flower fields all the way to the horizon.
This is a little tricky if you like to plan your trip in advance. The full bloom of Tulips, Jacinth, and other thousands of colorful flowers runs from the end of March until mid-May. But the peak lasts 1 or 2 weeks only depending on the weather conditions.
Our camper road trip was planned a month in advance and unfortunately, the weather was really hot and dry. The flowers were going to be picked in advance and we could already see photos on Instagram popping before we even arrived in The Netherland.
Amsterdam
Bruges
Lisse
Noordwijk
Zeeland
Cap Blanc Nez
Fun Fact: Are all those pretty flowers going to end up in a flower shop?
Most of the millions of tulips, for example, you can see in photos are not grown for their flowers. The plan is :
1 – Plant a bulb and wait for the flower to grow.
2- Once the flower is enough developed, you should cut the flower and most of the time leave it on the floor.
3- Now that the flower is gone, the energy will go back to the bulb which will grow and multiply.
4- When the 3 phases are done, you collect the bulbs, sell them worldwide and only keep one to start all over next year.
Since we were a week late to the blooming we drove to what seems to be a smart idea in the direction of France: Lisse, this is where you will find the world’s biggest flower exhibition: Keukenhof. It is only a 30 minutes drive from Amsterdam and every tourist in the capital takes a day tour to it, but when you escape the famous location you will have fields for yourself.
You can also go to the Noordoostpolder, Alkmaar, Zeewolde, or others, my advice would be to open Google Maps in satellite mode and look for those colorful fields.
Since we were a week late to the blooming we drove to what seems to be a smart idea in the direction of France: Lisse, this is where you will find the world’s biggest flower exhibition: Keukenhof. It is only a 30 minutes drive from Amsterdam and every tourist in the capital takes a day tour to it, but when you escape the famous location you will have fields for yourself.
You can also go to the Noordoostpolder, Alkmaar, Zeewolde, or others, my advice would be to open Google Maps in satellite mode and look for those colorful fields.
Once the tulip mission was over, came the second one. The seals and porpoises mission. They can be seen in Zeeland, where they live in the wild. At the Westerschelde and Oosterschelde estuaries and in the outer delta mostly. Spoiler alert, there won’t be any cute photos as they were nowhere to be found. But once again that did allow us to venture somewhere we did not have planned.
A night near one of the Noordwijk beaches was the perfect way to slow down the pace and enjoy a nice “van-made” dinner when the sky turns orange and you can only hear the sand caressed by the wind.
Let’s keep our journey towards Paris with a quick stop in Belgium and its chocolate capital also called The Venice of the North. You can easily park on the outside of Bruges and walk to the city center if you don’t have a skateboard. To quench your thirst pay a visit to the famous beer wall at 2be or Brasserie Cambrinus with soooooooooooo many types of beers!
Come next, the Opal Coast in France on the English Channel for 120 kilometers. The name was apparently given by a painter in tribute of the constantly changing light on either the cliffs or the sea. The most famous attraction being the Cap Blanc Nez, a chalk cliff from where you can see England on a bright day. The same cliff and material you can find in Dover before Time dug a channel between France and England.
This was sadly our last stop before driving back to Paris. We just cannot wait to take another van and discover places we would never have visited if not for the freedom and safety of having our own little home on wheels.
In a nutshell:
Indie Campers :
Address : A little bit everywhere near airports
Telephone : Frankfurt +49 30 58849195 Paris +33786853834
Website : https://indiecampers.com/