My mum and I nicknamed this tour "Cheese, Clogs and WIndmills". What a wonderful showcase of everything cliched we associate with Holland. From Amsterdam it was a coach ride through beautiful Dutch countryside, accompanied by informative and entertaining commentary. The tour included a boat trip from Marken to Volendam - two gorgeous little fishing villages. Try to make the time to have your photo taken in Volendam in traditional Dutch costume for a unique souveneir to take home. This was my second trip to Amsterdam and I was keen to get into the countryside this time. For a half-day tour, this was AWESOME! I would recommend this tour 100%.

Loved this tour! Very informative! Beautiful country side...boat ride was fun!

Great tour to the countryside! Beautiful places and a very nice informative tour guide!

Very Beautiful!!

Excellent trip to see a little bit of everything when your trip is only for a few days. If you love taking pictures of everything, this trip might not be good for you since you only stay around 30-35 mins in each place. Other than that, it was an excellent opportunity to see the windmills and how the clogs are made. We didn't see that much about the cheese though.

It was my best trip in Amsterdam. I loved it so much and I liked our guide, she was very helpful and friendly.

Fun day. Excellent tour guide.

Tania Dey writes:

This will probably be the most memorable conducted tour that I ever had. I knew that my stay in Flanders will remain incomplete if I don’t see the Dutch countryside and viator.com was my first choice, as I have traveled with them before (Montreal and Boston). The local tour operator, Lindbergh Excursions, had their office just a few steps away from Amsterdam Central Station (photo), which was our departure point. The tour was very informative. Our bus was equipped with GPS audio guide and our tour guide Erna (photo) seemed to have a thorough understanding of Dutch life and culture. Her personality and sense of humor added a different dimension to our tour.

Our first stop in this tour was the Village of Marken. The serenity of those cottage shaped vegetable dyed houses (photo), the beautifully decorated front porches (photo) and the ponds with duckies had a tranquil impact on me. It was raining every now and then, but that didn’t seem to reduce our enthusiasm at all. After a short walk, we reached the Clog and Cheese Factory in Beatrix Brug (photo). The inside was studded with typical Dutch wooden shoes or ‘clogs’ - some hand-painted (photo), some being raw (photo). We watched a guy making those nice shoes in front of us and a lady demonstrated some basic facts about their traditional cheese making. There was also an outlet to purchase souvenirs.

After an extremely refreshing boat tour, we reached the Village of Volendam, a stunningly beautiful fishing village on the bank of river IJ. We enjoyed our fish-n-chips dinner over here. The souvenir shops around had a good collection of keep-sake items including Delftware potteries (photo) and it felt like buying a few more. A stroll around the bank revealed some lively statues and a panoramic view (photo).

This time we walked through the village houses of Volendam with some amazingly beautiful decorations (photo) and boarded the bus again. Our final stop was the Village of Zaanse Schans, a UNESCO heritage place, famous for its fabulous Windmills (photo). Although lost in my endless photography (photo) and plunged in the beauty of the surroundings, finally I made it in time. Our driver with a huge clock (photo) showing the meeting time and with the warning of this place not having any public transportation, it was hard for us to forget when to get back. This place also had some souvenir shops, a cheese outlet (bought some mouth watering Smoked Cheese) and women with traditional costumes (photo), but windmills were the prime attraction to me.

Words are insufficient to describe this entire trip, but I tried …

Everything went as planned except for the weather. Our guide was a real trooper who got us where we had to go. She was fun and informative even though torrents of rain were coming down. Would love to take the tour in the sunshine in order to fully appreciate the beautiful scenery.

good trip
if i go by myself, take time to research on transport
save up lots of my time

It was a great travel!! No negative points! I recommended it!

worth the time and money and I will recommend it to those who have tight schedule.

Thoroughly enjoyed trip. A little more time at windmills would have been better. (personal choice)

GREAT TRIP AND BOAT RIDE