The Cube Houses: The Overblaak Development was designed by Piet Blom. Each cube, tilted on a 45° degree angle, was built to resemble a tree and together they represent a forest.

Riding the 27km from The Hague to Rotterdam was full of the industrial outskirts of towns and double backing to cross over a bunch of motorways. Uneventful but a great example of how the bike paths are still amazingly maintained, smooth and perfect bitumen, even though it not a popular area. We had prebooked EasyHotel again as it was in the city center and so convenient walking to places. Unfortunately unlike The Hague where the bikes were stored in secure parking with a swipe card, the Rotterdam hotel only had a bike rack outside on the street. We weren’t too pleased about leaving our bikes out in the open for two nights but we stripped the bikes down (lights, pump, saddles) locked them together and onto the bike rack and crossed our fingers. Luckily they were fine, quite possibly because a few points were in our favour: the weather was cold, raining and it was the low season, the reception was open 24hrs so there was people checking in at all hours, so standing nearby. I’m also pretty sure the hotel had security drive-bys too. Regardless we were thankful they were OK and spent the next few days walking the sights of Rotterdam.

Rotterdam – Europe’s largest port and voted 2015 European City of the Year by the Academy of Urbanism. It was very easy to see why. Due to extensive bombing during WWII when many buildings were destroyed, Rotterdam has become a stunning example of the old and new architecturally intertwined.

Central Station: as vast and modern inside as it is out.

The graceful ‘Swan’ – Erasmus Bridge.

But our absolute favorite was Market Hall, the first indoor market in the Netherlands opened in 2014 with over 100 artisan food stalls and a 40m-tall arc full of 230 residential apartments. The inside arc was covered with a floor to ceiling mosaic of giant fresh produce, exploding with color. We took quite a few laps around, drooling over all the amazing dishes, spices and sweets on offer, facing absolute indecision.

1 Euro hotdogs? Err we may have had a few of those. And Turkish pizza, and donuts….

Daily Costs:

Day 1
Hotel: €50
Cafe/Restaurant: €3
Groceries: €14.08
Total: €67.08/$96.95AU

Day 2
Hotel: €50
Groceries: €14.6
Cafe/Restaurant: €9.5
Total: €74.10/$105AU