Tour de Pays-Bas Day 5: Leeuwarden to Groningen

Full disclosure: To make up for what was a bit of a disappointing evening in Leeuwarden, we decide to do Day 5 a little differently. Facing a 65 km bike ride – on what is going to be the hottest day of our trip so far at 29C plus humidity – we would need to leave early in the morning if we wanted to get to Groningen at a decent hour (and have some time to recover from the trip). So we have a little cheat day.

In our defence, we were planning to take the train at some point in our journey to illustrate how well-connected the Dutch railway is. With a station in almost every town, taking the train is a pretty amazing option to have in the event of bad weather or feeling under the weather or, in this case, wanting some more time to explore a city and cut down on the time needed to get to the next destination. But we add a little compromise so we don’t feel too guilty about our biking break: we will get the train heading to Groningen but get off at the stop before, Zuidhorn, and cycle in from there, thus cutting our biking distance for the day from 65 km to 12.5 km (and give us the false illusion of still technically biking into our next destination).

We’d be feeling a little ashamed about this, but our decision is clearly the right one. We have a fantastic first half day in Leeuwarden, with a nice quiet coffee and light breakfast by a canal at the Bakery Café on Nieuwestad, a visit to the medieval part of the city where we see the unfinished leaning church tower the Oldehove (Leeuwarden’s Tower of Pisa, if you will), a good browse through all kinds of treasures at Boekenpassage De Rode Loper (a covered passageway filled with second-hand books, old prints and postcards and a room dedicated to chess matches), and a stroll along Nieuwestraat (this seems to have been the place to be with lots of appealing restaurants all lined up together along the canal. Don’t know how we missed this street last night!), where we have a terrific canal-side lunch at Het Broodhuys.

But the highlight and biggest surprise is thanks to the staff at the very excellent hobby store De Treinenpassage, where we are tipped off on a local art project called Miniature People. Artist Michel Tilma has placed tiny figurines (about 1 cm tall) around the city, each with its own story behind it. With our trusty map, we spend the morning looking for them. Even more fun than Pokémon Go! As the staff at De Treinenpassage said, "The map takes you places in the city you wouldn't otherwise go." He was absolutely right, it’s a truly unique way to explore Leeuwarden. (But you might draw a bit of attention to yourself as you're bent over searching intently in all the nooks and crannies of the walls of the city!) We only have time to look up seven of the 71 miniatures, but we’re already making plans to come back to find the remaining 64!

We are so engrossed with our miniature hunt that we’re almost in danger of not making the 1:20 p.m. train to Groningen. So we quickly bike to the station and, with the help of friendly ticket staff, we load up our OV chip card (a contactless card for transport over all of the Netherlands) with an extra fare for our bikes and we’re off. (That is, after a bit of intense maneuvering of our bikes into the train car. While they are allowed on board and you pay for them, there’s not always a lot of space.) It’s amazing how a few days of biking will make a train ride feel like a luxury cruise as what would’ve been nearly three hours on the bike is covered in about half an hour’s time.

Zuidhorn - Groningen: 12.5 km
Google Maps time: 42 minutes   Our time: 51 minutes

The train pulls into Zuidhorn and find ourselves in a very posh neighbourhood of tree-lined streets and mansions that look like meticulously decorated giant cakes. We make our way into the town’s small market square to buy some water, and then on to the bike path for our reduced but still very hot and tegenwind-heavy cycling journey into Groningen. Biking into the city from the north is lovely though, as we make our way in via a beautiful park, bridges and along canals until we reach the Hotel Miss Blanche.

The Hotel Miss Blanche is a beautiful if not luxurious (it wasn’t cheap!) hotel in the heart of Groningen situated along the Hoge Der A canal. But even fuller disclosure: we’ve been guests at this hotel before. On our first trip to Groningen three years ago, we embraced the city’s party culture with a bit too much fervour and woke up the next morning with one of the worst hangovers we can remember. It felt like a huge waste of this beautiful hotel room to wake up feeling so terrible so we booked a night here determined not to repeat this mistake!

But the main reason to visit Groningen is to reconnect with our friend Iris. Iris was and remains Borrel’s only bonafide Dutch server, who worked with us for about 10 months from the fall of 2018 to summer 2019. She’s lived in Groningen since her university days and wants to show us a side of her city we didn’t get to see last time. We spend a nice and relaxed afternoon stopping at her favourite local places, delighted to be in her hands and not have to think about where we want to go.

First up is the beach! OK, it’s not a real beach, it’s a man-made beach alongside a canal, but it’s a great spot to grab a drink, chill and catch up. (Plus, Iris’s brother lives across the street, so he pops over to say hello!)

Then we go for a stroll through a quiet residential area until we pass by Room, an ice cream shop, which is exactly what we need on this steamy day. (Iris says this is the best ice cream in town. We can tell, it’s packed!) Iris then leads us to the next stop on our unofficial tour, a cute café and cocktail bar called Bramble, where we grab a snack and a drink (plus they bring us a complimentary borrel plate of chips and olives).

Bramble is right across the street from our next destination, the beautiful Noorderplantsoen Park. It’s a sizable urban park, but as it seems to be the case in the Netherlands, you’re not likely to find a stretch of more than a kilometre without a café. And the Noorderplantsoen Park has one too: Zondag! We grab a high top in the shade for another drink and some people-watching.

We’ve warned Iris that we can’t make it too late of a night, so we head to dinner early (or at least early for Justin). While Iris has planned the day for us, we’re in charge of dinner with reservations at Weeva, a restaurant that’s been serving up old-school Dutch dishes since 1871. We can’t kid ourselves that this is strictly a work trip, but we do make a point of visiting any establishment that serves up traditional Dutch food in hopes of inspiration for a new menu item or two at Borrel. Justin has his eyes in particular on the Captain’s Dinner, an old-fashioned hearty dish consisting of kapucijners (field peas), bacon lardons (in this case, a lot!) and some surrounding condiments (mainly piccalilly, a relish which, when homemade, is the key to a good Captain’s Dinner according to Justin’s Uncle Ric).

If it sounds like a bit much on a hot and humid day, it is! Our waiter patiently advises against it but Justin is determined. Our waiter is equally perplexed by Alison’s choice of stamppot (we can’t blame him. It reminds us of the boerenkool orders that will continue to come in at Borrel even when Toronto is going through a heatwave). But our wish is his command! Indeed, Weeva prides itself on a kind of service not often seen these days, with the waiters dressed in shirt, tie and apron and the dining room is like something out of, well, the late 19th century!

Our waiter is of course correct about the Captain’s Dinner. All those beans are a big challenge (and the dish is a little on the dry side. … Justin wonders if some kind of fusion chili dish might be possible with kapucijners at Borrel instead?). But we made a good effort with our winter dishes on this summer night even as we envy Iris’s choice of salad. While we are definitely successful in not drinking to excess on this visit to Groningen, maybe we’ll need to heed the warnings of not eating to excess next time!

We hug Iris goodbye and are not ungrateful for the longish route back to the hotel by foot. It’s going to take a while to walk off this Captain’s Dinner …

LEARN FROM THE AMATEURS: While we’ve discussed the benefits of the Nederlandse Spoorwegen (NS) for when you just can’t bike it anymore, here are a few more notes: You’ll need to buy a separate ticket for your bike, which costs about 8 euros. This allows you to travel with your bike on the train all day. But you can only take your bicycle on the train during off-peak hours between 9 a.m. - 4 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. - 6:30 a.m. on weekdays (even if you stepped onto the train during off-peak hours, you’re supposed to exit once it’s rush hour). On weekends, bikes are allowed on at all times and the NS website claims bikes are also allowed on at all times during the months of July and August. It’s not a bad idea to show up well in advance of your train departure time to get your bike ticket. And while the option of boarding with your bike is great, it’s not always the most fun getting yourself settled. There are train cars designated for bike storage and the Dutch are used to travellers doing so, but it’s hard not to feel like a jerk when you’re haphazardly forcing your bike into a busier-than-expected car and having it take up a spot where passengers could be standing. For more info, visit the NS site.