|
Holland's Art Cities
2010 is the year that several of Holland's cities become an art gallery! Visit the “Art Cities” plus several other Dutch highlights, focusing on the artistic heritage of the country.
Available at any date for private groups of 2 – 15 people. Price available upon application. Rates are based upon vehicle and guide hire per day; groups of 7 - 15 would have a per person rate same/similar to one of our scheduled tours of the same length.
If you do not have a group of traveling companions and are still interested in this custom tour itinerary, you are welcomed to join a waitlist…We record who is looking for travel companions to make up a tour with them. We need between 6 and 8 persons minimum to operate a tour without it being uneconomic for us or too expensive for you. We will be happy to run the occasional special departure IF there is sufficient interest.
If you would like to check on or join a waitlist for this itinerary, please email us for full information: specialgrouptours@yahoo.com
Suggested Itinerary:
Amsterdam is one of Holland’s Art Cities but is best explored by foot, tram or boat. We recommend spending time independently pre or post this short highlight tour.
Spoilt for choice in Amsterdam! There’s simply so much to see and do - the Anne Frank Museum, the Van Gogh Museum, the Rijksmuseum for the finest collection of Dutch old masters such as Rembrandt, Frans Hals, Vermeer among others; there’s the flower market, Dam Square, Rembrandt House, where the man himself lived, the Resistance Museum dedicated to the local culture and resistance movement during the occupation of WWII... Garden fans may enjoy the immaculate eighteenth-century garden at the Willet-Holthuysen Museum…
Day 1, Tuesday
Departing Amsterdam, our first stop is Haarlem. Often overlooked by travelers, this pretty cobbled city of historic buildings and discreet oases (former monastery gardens now private courtyard gardens) is a lovely place. Here, we’ll find the Frans Hals Museum, the old almshouse where the artist spent his final years. The collection focuses on the 17th Century Haarlem School of Art.
Alas, this time of year is the wrong time for the fields to be bursting with tulips but we can trace the history of the bulb growing area in the Lisse ‘Black’ Tulip Museum. Discover the origins of the bulb region and its development into one of Holland’s biggest industries.
Leiden is a beautiful Dutch town with charming canal lined streets and lovely architecture. The birthplace of Rembrandt and the current home to the oldest university in the country, this was also home to the original Pilgrim Fathers for 12 years prior to boarding the Mayflower across to the New World. Interest permitting, we can explore true history versus myth in the American Pilgrims Museum.
Overnight: Delft
Day 2, Wednesday
We’ll spend time in Delft today; a place almost unchanged since Vermeer painted it in the 1600s, we will visit the Vermeer Museum and the famed Blue Porcelain Museum. The town is popular with tourists but, since this is our overnight location, we can miss the main and maddening throng.
The Hague is home to the Royal Family, the seat of Dutch government, the international criminal court, the Peace Palace and another of the ‘Holland Art Cities.’ On an orientation tour, we will see the fabulous medieval Parliament buildings, the ‘Lange Verhoot’ area with its spectacular homes and the almost hidden former servant houses.
Our highlight today is certain to be Mauritshuis. We’ll spend ample time here to explore the famous works including Vermeer’s ‘Girl with a Pearl Earring’ and ‘View of Delft,’ Rembrandt’s ‘Dr Nicolas Tulp’ plus works by Ruebens, Jan Steen, Holbein and Jan Brueghel the Elder. Also available, Gemeentemuseum, a modern art extravaganza featuring works by Mondriaan, Picasso, Monet, Kandinsky and Van Gogh and the Escher Museum dedicated to the works of the graphic artist.
Overnight: Delft
Day 3, Thursday
Our first stop of the day is Gouda. This is everything you’d expect of a Dutch country town. We’re in for a special treat as the cheese market is on Thursday mornings (July/August only!) Over 100 local farmers descend on the market with cheeses to be weighed, tested and graded for moisture and texture. There are also some exhibitions of local professions such as clog making and buttermilk production plus the wonderful stained glass of St Janskerk to see.
Rotterdam is one of Europe’s largest seaports and the city is home to some of the most important buildings of modern architecture, due to the city being completely decimated by bombs in WWII. There is just one ‘nook’ of old Rotterdam that has been faithfully reconstructed, Delfshaven. This charming area lined with gabled houses along the historic waterfront comes complete with a still working mill and several galleries and cafes.
Spend some time in the fine shrine to European art, Museum Bijman van Beungen, where you’ll find everything from the 14th Century through to modern day including the Flemish Masters. Here, enjoy works by Van Eyck, Rembrandt, Mondriaan, Kandinsky and Dali to name a few.
Also today, we’ll enjoy a stop at the impossibly pretty windmills of Kinderdijk. It’s a beautiful example of land reclamation by means of windmills. Yes, it’s a bit touristy, but lovely for all of that!
Overnight: Delft
Day 4, Friday
Medieval Utrecht is our first port of call, a compact city that was the epicenter of politics and religion in the Middle Ages. After an orientation tour with your guide, you’ll have time to explore as you wish. Now a university city, the well preserved grand houses along the scenic canals feature regional ‘wharf cellars,’ many of which are nice eateries, so a good choice for our lunch stop. Perhaps you’ll choose the popular Dutch snack of soused herring from a vendor instead?
Another of the ‘Holland Art Cities,’ Utrecht offers Museum Catherjine, a converted monastery that houses a collection of art and artifacts charting the history of Christianity in the Netherlands and Centraal Museum, hosting a collection that includes pieces influenced by the Italian Renaissance plus the Old Masters of the Dutch Golden Age. Also here, the home of Dick Bruna, now opened as a museum to his rabbit character Miffy.
Our next destination today is the National Park, “de Hoge Veluwe”, the largest national park in the country. Here we will visit the Kröller Müller Museum, with its impressive collection of impressionist works including Van Gogh and Mondriaan. The sculpture park next to the museum is marvelous, with its impressive works of Rodin, Legere and Henry Moore. One guide book claims this to be the most spectacular museum of the Netherlands!
Overnight: Apeldoorn/Arnhem area
Day 5, Saturday
Our morning can spent exploring the wonderful ‘Nederlands Openluchtmuseum,’ The National Open Air Museum, where we can step into more than 80 historic houses, farmhouses and mills recreating the rural Dutch life spanning two centuries. See how local farmers, mill workers, blacksmiths and fisherman lived and plied their trades.
In Apeldoorn, you will visit Palace Het Loo with its beautiful gardens; the palace was designed in the 17th century for William III and his Queen Mary. No longer used by the Dutch royal family (they moved out in 1975,) it was opened as a national museum, illustrating three hundred years of history of the House of Orange-Nassau. We will experience the opulence and play royalty for a while!
We will arrive back into Amsterdam late this afternoon.
Please note: All opening times are correct at time of printing this website. While we will do our utmost to include all of the properties mentioned as central visits, we reserve the right to change an attraction should it become impossible to deliver a planned visit due to changes in opening days or times that we could not have been aware of at the time of loading this tour to our website.
|
