Summer Holidays 2012–The Netherlands

For the last 4 years we have driven down into France for our summer holidays but this year we wanted something a little different, a bit closer to home and a bit cheaper.

I was put onto the uniquely Dutch concept of Bungalow Parks so after a bit of research we left home on a dull grey Friday morning at the end of August bound for the channel tunnel and beyond.

We arrived at our destination 12 hours later after driving through France, Belgium and most of The Netherlands. We were staying at the Landal Bungalow Park of Esonstad which is up on the North Sea Coast on the edge of Lauwersmeer which is a huge wetlands national park.

Our house was on the edge of the water and to be fair was exactly as it had been described in the brochure. Spacious, clean and will everything you could want facilities wise, this was our home for the week. Our house was on a small peninsular away from the main park of the park (but still only 5 minutes walk)

The View From Our Patio

This was certainly not going to be a beach holiday and the weather did not disappoint on that front but armed with a guide book (and diesel at 20p per litre cheaper than in the UK) we set out to explore.

Here are a selection of photos from our days out and of course all our photos can be found here in the album.

The fortified town of Bourtange

Very up close and personal with some Meer Kats at the  zoo at Emmen

The very pretty town of Sneek

Edam (yes where the cheese comes from)

You knew we would have some of these sooner or later

We even found an old submarine in a car park at Van Helder

Up periscope

And as for this! I have no idea except they all arrived on bikes before posing for this shot. We will never know.