Netherlands 24: Back at Duinrell

After a week in Amersfoort, we made our way west to Wassenaar to Duinrell for the second week of our 2024 trip. For anyone who doesn’t know, Duinrell is an amusement and holiday park, located about 10 km outside Den Haag.

Having gone to Duinrell for the first time in 2012 when the kids were little, we’ve been there many times since, with our 2024 trip being our eleventh visit! That’s saying something, given that the pandemic meant we couldn’t go for two years.

Arriving on Saturday morning, we met with family who’d arrived before us and headed around theme park. It isn’t possible to check into the holiday home until late afternoon, though you can go on site and use the facilities from when you arrive.

Having been there so many times, we have a pretty standard routine once we’ve checked in. This involves unpacking the car into our holiday home, getting the bikes off of the rack and riding into Wassenaar to Jumbo for a big shop.

As all of our bikes are equipped with decent sized panniers, plus my Gazelle HeavyDutyNL has a large crate on the front, it means we can carry a fair amount of shopping without much problem.

Outdoor seating for the cafés and restaurants on Langstraat

We didn’t just go to Wassenaar for our grocery shopping. With it being so conveniently located to Duinrell and a nice place to hang out, we’d go there multiple times during our trip, whether to browse the shops, grab a coffee, get something to eat, or just have a ride round exploring.

Riding back to Duinrell with the shopping — Selfie on the path in Duinrell

Around Duinrell

With the many attractions available on site, we’d usually spent a fair amount of time at Duinrell itself. Mostly, this was the rides and activities at the theme park, but also the Tikibad indoor and outdoor swimming pools, particularly on rainy days, if any.

The theme park rides and activities are largely free to use, while the Tikibad swimming pools can be quite expensive, depending on the type of accomodation you’re staying in. Those staying in Duingalows will get a number of free visits, depending on the length of your stay.

If you’re camping or staying with in a holiday home not owned by Duinrell, such those from Eurocamp, then you’ll get a number of discount vouchers instead.

The pool used to be significantly cheaper, it was possible to get day-long tickets and you didn’t need to book in advanced. But like with so many things, everything changed during the pandemic, with prices going up and new restrictions coming in, which is a shame.

I’ve seen a few people complaining about the pool cost, comparing it with Center Parcs, where the pools are free. While there’s definitely something in that, the pools and specifically the slides are on the whole much better at Duinrell. Also, at Center Parcs, you have to pay for everything else, while at Duinrell, everything else is largely free.

Now I’m not a massive one for theme park rides, so don’t go expecting any reviews. I’ve started going on a few more in the past couple of years, but I could easily take or leave them, if I’m honest.

Saying all that, while the rides won’t compare with some bigger theme parks, such as Alton Towers in the UK, they definitely win on the convenience factor. Being on site with unlimited access to the rides means you can come and go when you please.

It also means you can time things for when it’s quieter and the queues aren’t so long, which makes it far more enjoyable. Typically, it’s quieter during the week, rather than weekends and first thing after it opens at 9am.

Also, at peak times of the year, they open some of the rides in the evening on a couple of nights each week (usually Tuesday and Friday between 7-9pm). This is just for residents staying on site, so is nice and quiet.

In the evenings when everything is closed, you can wander round and explore the site. You can do this on bike too, which is something you can’t do in all areas when the rides are open.

View of Duinrell from the Kikkerrad ferris wheel

All of the playground area is open in the evenings as well, which is something we used to make use of a lot when the kids were young, as they could go and play while we had a drink!

The Plaza is another popular spot in the evening, with lots of people hanging round the area and making use of the various food and drink places there. It can get a little noisy at times, particularly when there’s big sporting events on, which are usually shown in the pub in The Plaza.

I mentioned above about the Duingalows, these are the holiday homes owned and managed by Duinrell themselves. In addition to these, Duinrell have various glamping and camping options.

We’ve never actually stayed in a Duingalow, as we’ve always stayed with Eurocamp (previously Alfresco). Duinrell used to have a number of different third parties like Eurocamp providing accomodation. Though in recent years, more and more of these have been replaced with Duinrell’s own accomodation.

While the Duingalows do look pretty fancy, especially the newer ones, they can be very expensive and cost significantly more than staying with Eurocamp. I’d also say the exterior space and facilities are no way near as good as Eurocamp.

In the higher end Eurocamp holiday homes, you get a really big, covered external decked area with big comfy seats as well as a gas barbecue. We find we spend a large amount of our time outside, whether it’s sunny or not. On this front, the Duingalows are nowhere near as well equipped.

Food and drink

As I mentioned, there’s a number of food and drink options on site at Duinrell, with quite a few concentrated at The Plaza and next to the playground, plus a few scattered around near the rides and in the Carrousel.

While the food options are generally adequate when you’re around the rides, we’d generally go back to our holiday home for lunch, rather than eat on site. Partly due to cost, but also as it tends to be a lot of fried food.

If you’re looking for somewhere to eat in the evening, or just fancy being a bit more adventurous during the day, I can definitely recommend taking the short walk out of Duinrell to some of the food and drink places in nearby Wassenaar.

There are many options available for all tastes and budgets, which are generally better value and quality than what’s available at Duinrell. While we’ve not been to everywhere, there are few favourites we have, which we returned to in 2024.

Luciano’s IJssalon

No Duinrell trip could be complete without multiple trips to Luciano’s IJssalon. This famous local ice cream shop is a very popular, with queues outside day and night. They have a superb selection of flavours and do a good coffee, which come with a little mini ice cream.

With lots of outdoor seating, it’s a great place to enjoy an ice cream on a sunny afternoon or in the evening after dinner. Though it does get pretty busy!

Restaurant De Zonnehof

Restaurant De Zonnehof is literally across the road from the entrance to Duinrell, so it’s definitely a very convenient option for anyone not wanting to eat on site. The restaurant has a selection of typical Dutch dishes and a range of pancakes.

It has both indoor and outdoor seating, with the outdoor terrace overlooking the impressive looking allotments nextdoor, which makes it a nice spot on a sunny day or evening.

We’ve found the food to be pretty good, but not award winning. Similarly, they have some tasty pancake options. My only criticism is service can be incredibly slow at times, so not an option if you’re in a rush!

Restaurant Barolo

Plein in the centre of Wassenaar is a popular spot to eat out, with several restaurants spilling out onto the square. In the past, we often ate at Pizzeria Ristorante La Scala, but were put off when they served a vegetarian friend of ours a chicken pizza, then tried to claim she ordered it by mistake.

They did then offer us a complimentary bottle of wine, which they subsequently forgot about and tried to charge us for it! That was enough to put us off, plus the pizza was OK, but not particularly amazing.

There’s another pizzeria we’ve been to in Wassenaar, Il Piacere, which is a short walk down the pedestrianised shopping street. Though there isn’t a lot of outdoor seating available there, plus I do remember them having a comically bad waiter!

We tried Restaurant Barolo, which is in Plein, for the first time last year. Barolo presents itself as a more upmarket Italian, which is apparent in the rudeness of their staff.

The food was passable, but not particularly amazing and made a mistake with our order, which they were particularly nonchalant about. Not somewhere we’d bother with again.

Pannenkoekenhuis ’s-Gravesande

Pannenkoekenhuis ’s-Gravesande is the closest true pancake house to Duinrell (excluding Restaurant De Zonnehof), being just a short walk from the Duinrell entrance along Storm van ‘s-Gravesandeweg.

’s-Gravesande is a popular choice for people staying at Duinrell and can get pretty busy at times. We’ve been turned away before, when they don’t have tables, so book ahead if you don’t want to be disappointed.

As you’d expect, they have a large selection of savoury and sweet pancakes, and they have a pleasant terrace out front, where you can enjoy your pancakes as the world goes by.

Outside Luciano's IJssalon — Outside Luciano’s IJssalon

In the queue at Luciano's IJssalon — Outside Luciano’s IJssalon

That’s it for the first post of the Duinrell leg of our Netherlands 24 trip. I’ll be back with some of the rides and activities we did while we were there.

This includes places we’ve been many times, such as to the beach at Wassenaarseslag and to Leiden, but also further afield, to Den Haag, the Burgemeester Waaijerbrug bridge and Huis ten Bosch, the royal palace in the woods.

At some point, I’ll update my Duinrell guide, which is now getting a little old. Maybe when I get round to writing about our 2025 trip…

Dom Cycling

A blog about cycling and urbanism, by someone called Dom

Netherlands 24: Back at Duinrell

Around Duinrell