Fully vaccinated and keen to travel, I set off in late April 2022 to visit family in Geneva, see a bit of Switzerland; spend a week with a friend in Sicily and lastly a week based in Amsterdam before flying home. Those of you who have read my previous travel reports will know I love train trips, art museums, plants and gardens. Add local architecture and food shops and markets to the list…
Travelling with KLM
Fortunately I arrived very early at the airport in Cape Town for my KLM flight to Amsterdam as it was chaotic. The queues were long; various connecting flights had been cancelled, including mine from Amsterdam to Geneva. I had a join a long queue of people who needed to be rebooked onto other flights. The KLM flight to Amsterdam was jam packed and left after midnight, an hour late. Service on board was also tardy and we were left starving until 10 am before breakfast was served.
On my return the flight also left late, but in this case I was very grateful as I might have missed the flight if it had left on time. Although I arrived at Schiphol Amsterdam almost 3 hours before the flight and only had cabin baggage, the KLM queue for international flights was so long and disorganized, that it took almost 3 hours to get to the boarding gate. I think the upsurge in passengers keen to travel has caught KLM unawares and they are short staffed and unable to cope. It was a very stressful experience.
Keukenhof
However, as they say every cloud has a silver lining, and as my rescheduled flight from Amsterdam to Geneva on the day I arrived was after 7pm, I was able to go to Keukenhof for the afternoon. This famous tulip garden is only 30 mins from Schiphol and busses leave from there every 20 mins during the tulip season. The person sitting beside me on the flight from Cape Town came too as her ongoing flight had also been rescheduled.
Keukenhof is tulip lovers’ heaven. I think sections of the garden are planted up by different tulip nurserymen. Each year the bulbs are renewed. There must be millions of bulbs and the combinations and maintenance are amazing. It is a beautiful, spacious garden complete with a lake, canals, a windmill, teahouse and lovely orchid house. Enjoy the photos below and visit if you get a chance.
Read about Weekends around Geneva
2022 Keukenhof gallery
