Gouda, Netherlands Cheesy Day Trip Itinerary
Gouda is best known for the cheese that bears its name, and visiting this city for a day is a great addition to your trip to the Netherlands. Gouda also has more going on than just cheese (though of course cheese is a big part of it). Cheese, stroopwafels, beer, pottery, and candles have all been major industries in Gouda. On your next trip to the Netherlands, I recommend you Gouda as a delicious, historical, and educational day trip!
Tip: Americans tend to pronounce Gouda as ‘good-ah’ but it’s actually pronounced more like ‘how-da.’
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Where is Gouda Located?
Gouda is located in South Holland, northeast of Rotterdam.
Interestingly, Gouda’s geography is what made cheese such an integral industry. The land is too low and soggy to grow crops, but grass can grow. This grass is great for feeding dairy cows whose milk is transformed into Gouda cheese.
How to Get to Gouda
The train system in the Netherlands is very easy to use and since the country is so small, you can get just about anywhere in under 2 hours. Most people use Amsterdam as their home base for their trip and from Amsterdam Centraal Station, it takes 45-50 minutes to get to Gouda.
We were staying in Rotterdam when we took our day trip to Gouda. We book the intercity train headed towards Utrecht Centraal and it was only 2 stops and 18 minutes to Gouda.
Of course, you can always rent a car and drive to Gouda, though parking may be difficult. The trains are so easy to use, I highly encourage that over a car. You don’t even need to pre-book train tickets – you can purchase them at the kiosks when you arrive at the station.
What to Do in Gouda
Cheese Market
On Thursday mornings from 10AM-12:30PM the main square holds a traditional cheese market. This runs from April to August and is a reenactment of how the market used to take place. The official trade in cheese lasted over 600 years in Gouda and only officially disappeared in 1995. Some of the traditionally-dressed cheese girls pass out samples while men reenact the handshake negotiations.
Be sure to get there early as the crowds are quite dense and it can be hard to see. There are also some seats in the first row for early arrivals. However, if you do arrive later, just be patient. Once people get their pictures, they tend to step back and let others get a chance to get to the front.
They also had a contest where you could guess the weight of a truckload of cheese and at noon, they announced the winner. You had to be in attendance to win, and the person closest would go home with an entire wheel of Gouda cheese.
There’s a lot more going on in the square than just the cheese market. Tons of stalls form a market selling everything from fruit and cheese to clothes. We picked up a container of delicious strawberries to eat as a snack (strawberries in Europe are on another level!). There are also lots of restaurants that line the square with outdoor seating to enjoy if the weather complies.
Town Hall
The town hall is located right in the main square and is the backdrop of the cheese market. Originally built in 1452, this building is still in use as an event space. You can visit for €3.50 (cash only).
The building is beautiful (the basement was especially surprising!), but the main draw of going during the cheese market is that you can get a great view of the market from the balcony on the 2nd floor of the town hall.
We only spent 20-30 minutes in here, but for the low entry fee, I feel like I got my money’s worth.
Gouda Cheese Experience
The Gouda Cheese Experience is a tour that takes you through the cheese production process, from milking the cows to packing and shipping. Gouda cheese recently became a Protected Geographical Status (much like Champagne wine in France) meaning that cheese can now only be called Gouda cheese if it comes from the Gouda cheese region in the Netherlands. There are over 550 million wheels of Gouda cheese produced in this region every year!
You can purchase tickets for the Gouda cheese experience on site or in advance. If you’re also wanting to book a trip to the Syrup Waffle Museum, you can buy a combination ticket to save some money. The Gouda cheese experience is not timed-entry. You can go through it at any time. It’s open from 9AM to 6PM every day.
When we first walked in, I was afraid the museum would be too geared towards children and that I’d be bored as an adult. Thankfully, I was wrong! The audio tour was really interesting and I walked away learning a lot. The ~90-minute tour concludes with a cheese tasting of 5 types of Gouda cheese, from “young cheese” that’s very new to “old cheese” that’s aged over a year.
Syrup Waffle Museum
The stroopwafel is the dessert of the Netherlands. Wherever you go in the country, you’ll find these delicious thin waffles with caramel filling. You can buy packs of them in grocery stores (traditionally served warmed over your coffee cup) or warm fresh ones from shops. You may know the stroopwafel, but did you know it was invented in Gouda?
The stroopwafel dates back to the turn of the 19th century when Gerard Kamphuisen first invented it. Now centuries later, you can tour the factory that still makes syrup waffles with his original recipe. I’ll warn you they are slightly different than the stroopwafels you’ll find everywhere else (and thus why they’re called syrup waffles instead of stroopwafels) – they are crispier and are filled with a cinnamon syrup instead of caramel sauce. Personally, I prefer the softer stroopwafels over syrup waffles, but it was still tasty.
The tour starts with a video and then you walk through the various stages of the production process with an audio guide. It’s a real factory making 1800 waffles per hour, so they require you rock a hairnet. Backpacks and purses aren’t allowed due to limited space, so you leave them on a rack that is waiting for you at the exit. There’s also a couple wacky features throughout the tour, including a giant hamster wheel and a slide that you take to get from one floor to the other. The tour ends with a fresh syrup waffle.
This tour does sell out, so you’ll need to make sure to sign up in advance for a timed-entry ticket. You can either book this tour by itself or as a combo ticket with the Gouda Cheese Experience.
Get Lost on Purpose
Like most cities in the Netherlands, Gouda has many canals lined with traditional canal houses. After doing all the more traditional touristy attractions, it was fun to just stroll around further from the city center and appreciate the quiet streets that were so quintessentially Dutch.
In Conclusion
Gouda makes more a great day trip for all ages. I really loved spending the day here and it gave me more appreciation for cheese and waffles, 2 of the most quintessentially Dutch foods. If you’re planning a trip to the Netherlands, I encourage you to venture outside of the major cities and explore the smaller towns that are so rich in their culture and history.
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