Jun 04, 2026
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Alkmaar’s Charm Beyond Cheese
Discover why this picturesque Dutch city deserves more than just a quick market visit from Amsterdam.
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Love Netherlands
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Dear Netherlands,
There’s an old saying in the Netherlands: God made the world, but the Dutch made Holland. Drive across Zeeland, past the Delta Works, and you start to understand. Or stand at Kinderdijk at sunrise, when the windmills catch the first light and the canals are mirror-flat, and you can feel 800 years of stubbornness built into the landscape.
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Photo via Love Netherlands
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In today’s email:
- Alkmaar Day Trip from Amsterdam: The Complete Guide
- At The Café — Café Chris — The Oldest Brown Café in the Jordaan
- Around The Web — Five Islands, One Tide — A Long Weekend on the Wadden, Volendam Day Trip from Amsterdam: The Complete Guide, Dutch Surnames of North Holland: Origins and Meanings + more
- From Love Netherlands — Rotterdam Day Trip from Amsterdam: The Complete 2026 Guide
- Dutch Food You Will Love — Boerenkaas — The Farmhouse Cheese With a Protected Name
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Alkmaar Day Trip from Amsterdam: The Complete Guide
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An Alkmaar day trip from Amsterdam is one of the most rewarding excursions you can make from the Dutch capital. Just 45 minutes by train, Alkmaar is a beautifully preserved North Holland city whose famous cheese market has run since the 17th century — but the city itself offers far more than wheels of Gouda. Canals, medieval streets, a remarkable weigh house, and a pace of life that Amsterdam has long since left behind make Alkmaar worth a full day of exploration. Love the Netherlands? Join our free newsletter for hidden Dutch gems → inlovewithnetherlands.substack.com Why Alkmaar Makes an Excellent Day Trip from Amsterdam Many visitors arriving in the Netherlands head straight for the big-name day trips from Amsterdam — Keukenhof, Zaanse Schans, or Volendam. Alkmaar is often overlooked, which is precisely what makes it so pleasant to visit. The historic centre is compact and entirely…
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Have you been there? Do you have a memory of this corner of the Netherlands? Hit reply and tell us — we’d love to hear your story.
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At The Café
Café Chris — The Oldest Brown Café in the Jordaan
Café Chris on the Bloemstraat opened in 1624 — making it, depending on whom you ask, the oldest continuously operating bar in Amsterdam. The bell-pull next to the urinal is still wired to the bar, so the bartender knows when to flush. The walls hold framed Ajax memorabilia from the 1970s, and the regulars are mostly Jordaan locals who have been coming since their fathers brought them in for the first jenever. It’s small, it’s loud on Saturday nights, and it’s one of the most authentic brown cafés left in the city.
👉 Visit the café
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Around The Web
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From Love Netherlands
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Photo: Shutterstock
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Dutch Food You Will Love
Boerenkaas — The Farmhouse Cheese With a Protected Name
Boerenkaas is the protected designation for cheese made on a Dutch farm with raw milk from that farm’s own cows, by the farmer themselves, with no industrial shortcuts. It tastes nothing like the supermarket Gouda. Younger wheels are creamy and sweet; aged ones develop deep crystalline cracks and a flavour that lingers for minutes. Every Friday, in Alkmaar’s old Waagplein cheese market, you’ll see boerenkaas being weighed on antique scales — a pageant for tourists and a real trade for cheesemakers. Pair it with apple, walnut and a glass of jenever.
👉 Read the full story
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