Tiptoe Through the Tulips

Our first journey into the Dutch countryside began with a necessary trip down to Den Haag to apply for our India visas. From there Darin, Ken + I took the train to Leiden and rented bikes. It was a cool, overcast day and we bundled up for the ride. Armed with a fantastic map that showed every road and bike trail, and included symbols for tulip fields and windmills, we headed North. Leiden itself is a pretty University town and we wound our way through, over bridges and down lanes. Once out, the countryside opened up immediately into green fields dotted with wild clumps of daffodils. We encountered our first flower field about half-hour out. Not the tulips I had expected, but hyacinth. If you know flowers, you know how fragrant a small boquet of these can be. Now imagine thousands, MILLIONS. They permeate the air with a cloyingly sweet, heady aroma like nothing I've ever experienced! One field soon opened onto the next, and the next - What a sight! Not only were the hyacinth in full bloom, but daffodils, many kinds of narcissus and lilies too. The tulips were JUST starting, but their single buds rose on tall stems, searching for the sun. We cruised along and, toward dusk, reached the town of Lisse where we were hoping to find a room for the night. After checking at the few places in town and finding them all full, we were directed towards the coastal town of Noordwijk. It was cold and beginning to sprinkle by this point so we cycled hard for the next 45 min. on sore butts and lucked out at the second pension we found in town. Relieved, cold + hungry we dropped our daypacks and headed out in search of dinner. Right now, it doesn't get dark in Holland until after 10:00 PM, which can be a problem when you've arrived in a small town after that point. We were beginning to think we might be out of luck until we found ONE Italian restaurant still open. Not only was it good, but one of the best meals I've had since leaving the States! The porcini/truffle raviolis were washed down with a nice bottle of red. We all slept like babies and awoke refreshed, if not a little sore. It was quite cold when we set out that morning and we weren't very encouraged with the aches and pains, but our moods brightened and hats + gloves started coming of the further we got away from the coast. We were in the fields again and the sun was even peeking from behind the clouds. The array of colors and expanse of the fields delighted us and made us eager to discover what lay around the next bend. Our bodies had all had ENOUGH of that hard seat by late afternoon and we had a long way back, so we looped back toward Leiden and vowed to return in a week and check out the progress of the Tulips.

8 Days Later - Amsterdam and visiting with friends occupied much of our time, so now we only had one day left. Ken had left for Berlin, and now Darin + I were on our own again. It was a warm, sunny morning that we took the train to Haarlem. We quickly rented bikes and headed South, hoping to see the Northern reaches of the fields this time. An hour later we were there and surprised at the amount of bike traffic + flurry of activity in the fields. Many of the people cycling appeared not to be locals, but most all were Dutch. For such a small country, it was nice to see them checking things out too! A week with warming weather HAD made a difference and tulips were now blooming by the BILLIONS in huge fields of varying color. What a feast for the eyes! I learned alot about the industry that afternoon as in one field we witnessed people walking through plucking out the oddballs. In another, teams were cutting by hand as tractors hauled off piles of cut blooms. In another, multiple generations of a family were on tractors sorting through the bulbs being dug up. And the most shocking - A machine that was hand-pushed down the rows to decapitate the blooms! (I never knew that was how they keep the energy in the bulbs) Almost every field had SOMETHING going on, but we eventually came across one VAST field - The largest expanse of flowers we'd seen ALL in full bloom by far! The tulips ranged from pink to red to yellow, coral + white, stripped, low, tall - All laid out in wide bands that stretched for what seemed an infinity. Amazing! Everyone that biked past was stopped in their tracks. We stayed and admired it all until, short on time, we made an all-out push to get back to Haarlem just in time to return our bikes. Totally unforgetable!

Here's a "link" to more photos