NETHERLANDS || Rotterdam - travel vlog (plus Kinderdijk, Vollendam, The Hague) 15 Degrees North

15° North are travelling again! This time we are in The Netherlands, visiting Europe’s largest port, Rotterdam, and its surrounding area, South Holland. There we visit: Kinderdijk, Marken, Vollendam, Zaanse Schans, The Hague, Delft and Rotterdam.
Jérémy and Ben here again! We love to travel and to satisfy our wanderlust, we are on a European roadtrip exploring the best places for a city break on the continent. We love to escape Britain to experience the best culture, cuisine and attractions that Europe has to offer. If you’re a tourist like us and just need a good itinerary for what to do and how to do it when you’re in Rotterdam, we will show you the best things to put on your itinerary.
Make sure you subscribe: ruclips.net/channel/UCNCk...
Check out our UK Playlist: • ENGLAND || Cornwall - ...
Follow us on Instagram: @fifteendegreesnorth
Music: www.purple-planet.com
Holland is a region of the Netherlands, which contains around a third of the country’s population and includes its three biggest cities. We’ll cover Amsterdam in another video, because on this trip we explored Rotterdam, The Hague and the low-lying Dutch countryside, most of which has been reclaimed from the sea using a remarkable network of dykes and windmills.
We started at one of the country’s most beautiful spots - Kinderdijk - which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Built at the confluence of two rivers, these nineteen windmills were built in 1740 to drain the nearby land of water. With most of its land below sea level, the Netherlands has spent centuries battling against the waters of both the sea and its rivers, in an attempt to reclaim as much arable land as possible. And - if you think about it - it’s remarkable that it’s had such utilitarian infrastructure for so long.If only large-scale infrastructure projects nowadays were as pretty as these gorgeous windmills!
The Netherlands has historically divided by the Zuiderzee, an large inlet of the North Sea, but in the 20th Century large portions of land were reclaimed from it and the sea turned into a lake. The fishing village of Marken used to sit on an island in the sea. Nowadays it sits on a peninsula in the lake. Across the water is Vollendam, a suburb of which is called Edam, named after the cheese. No. The cheese was named after the town, you fool.
Next we headed to Zaanse Schans. Sitting in the suburbs of Amsterdam, it was somewhat overrun with tourists and we couldn’t help but think that this was the hotspot for visitors to the city who wanted to see some authentic Ducth windmills without straying too far from the city. There are plenty of windmills there, but we much preferred Kinderdijk.
Next, we headed to The Hague. And not because we are on trial for War Crimes. We visited at the end of December, so we were short on light. But we didn’t let that stand in our way! We actually found it to be quite the smart city, with a large city centre with plenty of landmarks, sitting beneath striking skyscrapers. And I love a city that manages to get that balance right between old and new. And they managed that in The Hague really well.
Delft is well worth a visit, even if it bucketed down with rain when we were there. The home of Baroque painter Vermeer, it’s a picture perfect Dutch town just outside Rotterdam.
Our final stop is Rotterdam itself. The second city of the Netherlands, Rotterdam is Europe’s largest seaport. Crowded around its vast network of canals, quays and waterways, there isn’t much left of the historic city that dates back to the thirteenth century. Why is that? The Nazis. Unfortunately Rotterdam was completely destroyed in The Blitz, with almost the entire city centre flattened and burned by bombs dropped by the Luftwaffe on the 14th May 1940. The city was so heavily bombarded that the individual fires across the city became a firestorm, killing 900 people, wiping out 642 acres of the urban centre and destroying 25,000 homes, 2000 shops, 62 schools and 24 churches. Rebuilt between the 1950s and 70s, modern Rotterdam looks significantly different than it used to. And that’s the understatement of the century.
Part of the rebuilding of the city centre included this quite remarkable district, known as the Cube Houses and designed by renowned Dutch architect Piet Blom. Based on the idea of “living as an urban roof”, the houses sit on hexagonal pylons above shops on street level. The cube of a conventional house has been titled sideways, with the idea that this unusual shape optimises space on the inside. Most of the houses are still inhabited today, but one has been opened as a museum and the interior has been maintained in the style in which it was built back in 1972.
Rotterdam is most famous for the bridges that span its vast harbour. We were there for New Year’s Eve, when there is usually a striking firework display on the Erasmus Bridge.

[@rafaelandres9728]

"promosm" 👏