Places to stay in Amsterdam

coelurus · Post by **coelurus** » Fri 23 Mar, 2007 8:49 am

I happen to be a board member in a little society for space freaks at the university I'm in and we've arranged a little trip to ESTEC and other similar places in the Netherlands. Not only am I a board member, I'm responsible for finding a place (or several places) for 21 people to stay two nights (3rd to 5th of April makes two nights) close to Nordwiijk, Leiden or Amsterdam. I've looked up a couple of hostels in Amsterdam that serve breakfast and I sent them an E-Mail each for booking information. They're a little slow to reply (one did, telling me they were full-booked while another site said there were some beds left, wonderful) and I'm getting a bit nervous...

I figured, since there are quite a few people from the Netherlands around here, I thought I'd ask for some general advice

Anybody got some?

King Harold · Post by **King Harold** » Fri 23 Mar, 2007 10:55 am

http://www.hotelschiphol.nl/pages/Default.aspx?ID=59
they want you to look on this site:
http://www.valk.com/pages/?ID=3376&propertyCode=SCH&i=0

not small (435 rooms), it's near Amsterdam, and easy to reach. You didn't tell which hotels you already tried though..

But you might like to stay further away from Amsterdam (I would), say, Leiden, or Utrecht (which is almost in the middle of the Netherlands, so you can go everywhere from there).

I would recommend this one:
http://microsite.biltschehoek.valk.com/ ... spx?ID=554
Near Utrecht, usually the hotel part isn't full but in the evenings the dinner part can get quite crowded. It's not far away from the highway, but far away so that you won't stay awake from the traffic.
some more links to this hotel:
http://www.valk.com/pages/?ID=3376&propertyCode=BIL
http://www.hoteliers.com/de-bilt/van-de ... sche-hoek/
http://www.bookings.org/hotel/nl/vdvbil ... aid=308395
http://www.bookings.net/hotel/nl/vdvbil ... aid=300001

blueskies · Post by **blueskies** » Fri 23 Mar, 2007 5:25 pm

You might also try out www.hostelworld.com. I used that to find all my hostels when I was travelling in South America.

coelurus · Post by **coelurus** » Fri 23 Mar, 2007 5:28 pm

Woah, thanks a bunch! But the stuff you listed seems to be hotels, not hoStels.

To be more specific, we're going to places close to Nordwiijk and Leiden and it has to be _cheap_. I currently got in contact with St. Christophers in Amsterdam, I don't know yet how many beds they got.

EDIT: I've tried hostelworld, I used a similar site to search for hostels in Amsterdam and I've contacted four by E-Mail (got two replies by now). Still, I appreciate any advice!

hop · Post by **hop** » Fri 23 Mar, 2007 6:50 pm

A phone call is faster.

King Harold · Post by **King Harold** » Fri 23 Mar, 2007 8:37 pm

And they will speak english, or they will atleast have someone who does.

Where did you find anything saying "Nordwiijk" though? Afaik it's "Noordwijk"

Van Der Valk is not the cheapest.. try a youth hostel?

coelurus · Post by **coelurus** » Sat 24 Mar, 2007 7:25 am

Unless I get answers soon enough, I will have to start calling around, haven't spoken English for quite a while though, gonna be fun

Slip of doubles, it should have been Noordwijk everywhere...

I'm trying a couple of hostels right now, but finding 21 beds not too far apart is a bit tricky.

Timendus · Post by **Timendus** » Thu 05 Apr, 2007 11:30 pm

Wow... King Harold, you just Google Earthed my parents' house

About 3 centimeters from the arrow

. You could've taken the screenshot with north pointing upwards though

King Harold · Post by **King Harold** » Fri 06 Apr, 2007 6:30 am

Afaik it does have north pointing upwards.. or close to upwards anyway.

3 cm's on that map is long way..

@coelurus: you should be back by now - if you went at all

, so how did it go? where did you stay?

coelurus · Post by **coelurus** » Mon 09 Apr, 2007 2:13 pm

I'm back and the room was alright, not the best place but atleast all 21 could sleep in the same room

Some place in Utrecht, quite a bit from Delft/Katwijk/Leiden where we were actually going.

King Harold · Post by **King Harold** » Mon 09 Apr, 2007 2:32 pm

Nothing is ever far in the Netherlands

So where did you stay? In Utrecht ok, but Utrecht is big..

coelurus · Post by **coelurus** » Tue 10 Apr, 2007 6:49 am

Utrecht is pretty big alright, but there aren't a lot of hostels and similar there. B&B Utrecht.

The interesting part was the trips to the space facilities, I'll see if I can get hold of some pics in some way.