Half-Day Tour of Zaanse Schans Windmills from Amsterdam

0 2.042 Added on 10.06.2019

Readable in 4 minutes

Experience the historic windmills of Zaanse Schans on a bus tour from Amsterdam with a professional guide. Learn about cheese making, walk on clogs, see the inside of a functioning windmill, and see the green-painted wooden houses and shops.

Experience

Highlights

Explore the working windmill village Zaanse Schans
See windmills from the entire Zaan region from the 18th and 19th centuries
Visit a wood shoemaker and learn more about the traditional wooden shoe
Admire the elegant homes of wealthy merchants and windmill owners
Learn how the windmills were used to make cocoa powder and oil for food
Try the typical Dutch cheese in a dairy

Half-Day Tour of Zaanse Schans Windmills from Amsterdam

Full description

Meet your tour guide and driver at a central meeting point directly opposite Amsterdam Central Station. A comfortable, air-conditioned single-decker bus takes you to today's destination in just 20 minutes.

The windmill village Zaanse Schans is an open-air museum with a collection of windmills, wooden houses, barns and shops from the 18th and 19th centuries. All of these buildings were brought here from 1961 to bring this most prosperous time of the Zaan region back to life.

In its heyday, the Zaan region, with its 600 active windmills, has developed into an industrial area of unprecedented scale: wood factories driven by the wind. In these small factories wind energy has done many jobs: sawed wood, ground spices, oil for food and colors, flowers, cocoa powder and much more.

Prosperity in the 18th and 19th centuries can be seen in the windmill village Zaanse Schans in several respects. In addition to windmills, barns and other buildings, you will see beautiful houses that were originally built as a home for rich windmill owners and traders. These houses have attractive facades and are painted in traditional colors such as green, beige and light blue.

Upon arrival in the village, your guide will guide you through the village on an orientation tour. You visit the Holzschuhmachermuseum and in the cheese dairy you can taste Dutch farm cheese. Then it's time to explore the village on your own. Before you set out to discover the Zaanse Schans on your own, your guide will give you more information about the Zaanse Schans and its unique character, teach you local history and culture, and give you insider tips on what to do and where to go is going.