We took a coach tour from Amsterdam Central Station with “Tours and Tickets”.
It was very well organised by the coach company with a courteous English speaking driver, who was also a very careful driver.
That was the better organised part of the day however.
I had been pre-warned by some friends who had visited the Floriade a few weeks ago, but I hoped it would be further completed by now.
We paid €68 per person for this trip but we can only say we felt it was a waste of time and money.
The Floriade was only partly completed with lots of areas and exhibits not yet finished, or planted up, and those that were finished (a few) were decidedly underwhelming!
The best part was the cable car over the park, one way trip included in the ticket and a very long walk back unless you paid extra for a return ticket. Signposting and labelling not clear either…maybe unfinished.
This is a huge area and lots of walking involved, which we didn’t mind, but we were searching for something with a wow factor, given this is only a ten year event.
There were some nice areas of planting but many areas were not planted up or such small plants with no impact yet, very disappointing.
The greenhouse was also very disappointing, not much to see.
We stopped there for a light lunch which was ordinary but still very expensive …we were even charged €2 per person for two paper cups of water from a chiller machine, presumably tap water!
We understand with Covid issues worldwide that some supplies might be affected, but therefore we feel they shouldn’t have opened an exhibition on a site which clearly wasn’t ready for the public.
We are annual visitors of the Chelsea Flower Show in London where they manage to construct beautiful gardens and displays, in a much smaller space, in just a few weeks…I suppose this has spoiled us as we expected it to be of the same standard.
We had visited the stunning Keukenhof gardens the previous day which was a wonderful experience and completely ready for visitors.
In conclusion we wouldn’t recommend a visit to the Floriade but visiting Amsterdam and particularly Keukenhof has left us with wonderful memories of this lovely country and its charming and welcoming people.
