My Palace, My symphony of life and the rhythm in My heart: Europe Trip- Netherlands

Saturday, November 15, 2014

Europe Trip- Netherlands | Volendam

15th November 2014

The trip in Netherlands had been continued with an excursion to Volendam; which is a fishing village locating on the shores of Markermeer Sea. Volendam, another popular tourist destination in the Netherlands which is approximately 25 minutes away from Amsterdam. Tour guide had informed us that the lunch of the day was fish and chips in one of the famous Volendam restaurant. Well, the cold weather here had engendered me feeling hungry at an earlier time. It was just 11.30am.

Along the journey, a brief explanation from the tour guide:

Volendam is famous for its fresh-water fishing and the Dutch traditional clothings which are still worn by the residents here. Volendam is currently with the population of approximately 22,000 residents and most of the community’s income sources are derived from fishing and tourism.

We passed by Volendams Museum. The tranquil surrounding, the nice houses along the roadside of Volendam wasn't lost to be compared to Zaanse Schans.

The first scene we stepped down the bus was ducks floating idly on the moats or river banks.

We wandered past on the roadway and the shores could be seen. On the right side of roadway towards the harbor, the picturesque Dutch village was captivated my attention.I couldn’t help falling in love with Volendam with the sight of fishing sail boats, yachts, quaint Dutch architecture along the streets and stylish gardens of Dutch houses. It’s like strolling along a place which you could see in fairy tale setting. The gardens of the Dutch villages were well-designed and you could spot many Disney miniatures.

The seven dwarfs were spotted!

The Snow White must be in the house :)

The dream houses!

I was enthralled with the cute couples miniatures and had a photo taken with one of them.

The owner of the house must be worried as so many tourists dropped by their houses to hug, touch and capture with their cute miniatures.

Some of us had been obsessed with the photography session and got lost with the rest.We wandered along the street cafes spotting the possible shops with fish and chips as the main menu. We had gone past around 2-3 fish and chips shops lining along the fishing harbor. At last, we decided to snap photos while searching for the rest of the groups. After few minutes, we saw our tour guide waving hands towards us and led us to Van den Hogen restaurant.

Van den Hogen restaurant located at the strategic place of Volendam, on the Dike overlooking the harbour. It is ranked as 3rd place out of 24 restaurants in Volendam. We had Fish and Chips at this pre-booked restaurant.

Traditional costumes

I thought it was just seasoning soup at the first sight of the soup. After we asked the waitress, it was full-flavoured fish soup with plenty ingredients. We had fried codfish” mustard sauce” as our main meal which came along with sets of potatoes (roasted , chips, boiled), a bowl of cubed carrots and salads. The fish was very fresh and tasted very good. Dame Blanche was served as dessert. You could have a mouthful of whipped cream and warm molten chocolate or dipping the stroopwafels with vanilla ice-cream.

Salads

The best potato fries I ever had.

Cubed carrots.

My fish and chips.

The roasted potatoes which I forgot to capture earlier.

Dame Blanche

After tasting Dutch seafood specialties -fish and chips, we were given approximately an hour to walk around this "the pearl of the Zuiderzee". Compared to the shocking price tag at London, the shirts here were sold at much reasonable price. We managed to get two nice shirts as souvenirs. Well, we shall have taken the traditional costumes group photo.