One week on Ameland – West Frisian Islands

As globalisation and digitalisation progress, our society is changing faster and faster. Everyone is always reachable and even on holiday you are constantly connected to the rest of the world through emails, text messages, messenger messages and social media. To prevent this, you have to actively decide against it. One week on Ameland is just right for this.

Of course, it’s not enough just to visit this beautiful island, but the island mentality helps you to slow down and let life be life. Whether in a hotel, in a holiday flat or on a campsite, whether alone, as a couple, with friends or family, with a dog or without, Ameland offers a suitable holiday experience for everyone.

Overview of one week on Ameland

Instead of going by day or topic I decided to sort things on this small island by village, from west to east:

• Hollum
• Ballum
• Nes
• Buren
• General Information
• Map of Ameland

What is Ameland?

Ameland is one of the West Frisian Islands in the north sea off the coast of the Netherlands. At 24 kilometres long and up to 5 kilometres wide, Ameland is not a tiny island, but you can easily reach everything by electric scooter or bicycle. If that’s not for you, buses also run several times an hour between the island’s four villages. You can easily rent a bicylce or electric scooter at Rijwielverhuur Nobel or Fietsverhuur Metz Ameland.

The island has an eventful history, which can be learnt and experienced in several museums. The island also offers activities for adventurers, from high ropes courses, surfing and beach rides to parachute jumping. Those who prefer a beach holiday will feel right at home on the 27 km of sandy beaches.

In this article, I give an overview of everything I did during that week in the four villages on the island, as well as a brief overview of general information such as the holiday flat, bike & scooter rental and shopping facilities for daily needs.

Hollum

Hollum is the largest settlement on Ameland and also the most populated. It is the westernmost one and the one with the lighthouse.

Eeterij Tante A’n

Restaurant and café Tante A’n is an well loved place on Ameland that has moved with the times. The interior is modern and offers free Wi-Fi. But the tradition of the establishment is also honoured.

The restaurant was named after Antje de Boer, whose father used to run a bakery in this very building. Remnants of the old bakery can still be seen today.

Unlike in Germany, gluten-free dishes / adaptations of dishes are not a problem. Instead of baguettes, there was gluten-free baguette, a gluten-free cake is always on the menu and for coffee there is a caramel sweet instead of a biscuit. It can be so simple.

Vishandel Metz Hollum

To buy fresh fish, seafood or fish specialities, you should go to Metz and avoid the frozen products from the supermarket. In addition to the counter, they also offer a selection of fish and seafood dishes. From deep-fried fried fish with chips to mussels in a vegetable broth, you can round off the evening with a delicious dish at the tables on site or back at your accommodation as a take-away.

Smikkel Skuur

Smikkel Skuur serves ice cream in Hollum on Ameland. You might not get the same ice cream twice, but their choices are always delicious.

In the picture you can see Stracciatella, Strawberry-Yoghurt and Salted Caramel. The Salted Caramel was my favourite, a perfect blend of sweet and salty in a creamy ice cream.

The shop only offers take-away, there are no seats, but going for a walk with your ice cream in hand is nice, especially when the weather is amazing.

Stichting Paardenreddingboot Ameland

The Abraham Fock Maritime Museum was built around the former lifeboat station in Hollum. As the name and location suggest, it is centred around the history and development of sea rescue on Ameland. The centrepiece of the exhibition is the Abraham Fock lifeboat, which was pulled from the station to the sea by 10 horses for decades. This spectacle can still be witnessed today, but it is no longer necessary for a ship to be in distress.

On fixed dates, the village farmers bring their horses to the station and practise launching the boat. If you would like to see this spectacle, you can find out the current dates on the museum’s website: www.amelandermusea.nl

Museum Sorgdrager

The cultural history museum in Hollum is partly housed in an old, traditional captain’s house. This house is part of the exhibition and shows how people lived on Ameland at the time of whaling. The attic contains furniture and everyday objects from several centuries and portraits give an insight into the appearance and fashion trends on the island.

A digital audio guide leads you through the museum in several languages. You can access the museum’s Wi-Fi, download an app and access the audio and video sequences stored at various stations as you wish.

Bornrif Lighthouse

No island or coastline is complete without it: Lighthouses. The beacons that show ships the way.

The lighthouse on Ameland, built in 1880/81, is 55 metres high and can be climbed via 236 steps.

Once at the top, you have a great view over the island and, depending on the weather, you can also see the neighbouring islands of Terschelling and Schiermonnikoog, as well as the North Holland mainland.

Ballum

Ballum is the smallest village on the island and after the “Nobles Nostalgish Museum” closed, only one of the things I can recommend for a visit here is inside the village. The other two are reachable by bike or electric scooter.

Nobeltje

The Nobel family has divided up the village of Ballum between them. One runs the hotel with restaurant and café, one runs the distillery where Nobeltje is produced, one runs the aforementioned museum and the last runs the bicycle sales and hire business.

So it is hardly surprising that they support each other and pass customers on to each other. For example, if you hire a scooter from one Nobel, you get a Nobeltje from the third Nobel when you buy a hot drink from the second Nobel.

And after a glass, you think about taking a bottle of the rum liqueur home with you. Because the original is only available from and on Ameland. And I did buy one, as someone who does not like rum!

Amelander Bierbrouwerij

Amelander Bierbrauerei is a small, family-run brewery in a converted barn in the middle of the meadows between Ballum and the North Sea. In addition to the brewery, which can be visited, there is also a tasting room and plenty of seating in the garden under the sun in summer.

In the barn, the family keeps a ‘Beerwall of Fame’ where they collect beer bottles from all over the world. When I was there there were already over 1000 and they said there were more every day.

If you can’t decide on a beer, you’re in luck! With the beer tasting you can try 3 beers at once. There is also Amelander cheese and sausage. Very tasty. My favourite was the light beer.

Dijkwachter

The monument to the Dijkwachter, the dyke guards who used to risk their lives to check the water level so that they could warn residents of a spring or storm tide if necessary, is located directly on Ballum Bay and is easily accessible by bike.

One man walked to the highest point of the dyke with a lantern, while a second man stayed behind the dyke, holding a rope that was wrapped around the first man’s waist as protection against the wind.

Nes

Nes is the second largest settlement on Ameland, it is the one most people see first, since it has the ferry harbour.

‘t Commandeurtje

‘t Commandeurtje is a small gift- and candy shop in Nes on Ameland. Their “theme” are wadden related products, based on the “Wadden Sea“, the islands borders. Right next to them is the liquor store Slijter De Jong which is located in an authentic Ameland commander home and sells an herb liquor which is also called “Commandeurtje”. If you like herb liquor, you’ll like this one, too.

Galerie Ameland

We found the Ameland Gallery through a programme called “Wunderschön” on the German public broadcast channel WDR. In the small gallery space, artists from the island (Wim Kiewiet, Richard Kiewiet and Rinnie Wijnstra to be precise) exhibit their paintings and figures. The artworks are mainly still life from the island, landscape paintings and the occasional animal and human portrait.

If a whole painting is too expensive, or if you can’t find space for it in your own four walls, you can buy prints of selected paintings as postcards.

Overzee: Bistro & Logement

The Overzee: Bistro is a very tastefully decorated restaurant with an outdoor terrace and fresh, flavoursome cuisine. They try to source as much produce as possible directly from the island and process as much as possible to produce less kitchen waste. For example, the dish of the day when we were there was roast lung from the cow.

As I don’t have much of a taste for offal, I had the beef carpaccio instead and afterwards for dessert a latte macchiato and a mini cheesecake.

Natuurcentrum Ameland

The Ameland Nature Centre has a main exhibition dedicated to the special features of Ameland as a Wadden Sea island. Part of this is a large North Sea aquarium (observant visitors can also find out which sunken village the aquarium is modelled on), as well as many smaller aquariums housing native fish and sea creatures. Films, showcases and models illustrate the formation of the island and the effects of wind, weather and tides.

Changing travelling exhibitions deal with related topics such as plastic pollution in the sea, the effects of climate change and much more.

There is also an observation tower high above the main building from which you have a great view over the North Sea and the Wadden Sea.

Buren

Buren is the eastern most settlement on Ameland, despite being located in the middle of the island. The one further east, Oerd, sank at some point. Now the entire area east of Buren is sand dunes, flora and some beaches.

Fun fact: Two ferries were named after the two sunken villages of the island: MS Oerd and MS Sier.

Restaurant StrAnders

The StrAnders restaurant lives up to its name (In German: Strand = beach + anders = different). It is located near one of the beach accesses of Buren and does many things differently from other restaurants. Wherever possible, only Ameland island products are used. From fish and lamb to mustard and vegetables, almost everything comes from the island.

The rack of lamb with Ameland mustard and potatoes in port wine sauce is particularly recommended.

Landbouw-Juttersmuseum Swartwoude

Beachcombing, or ‘jutttern’ in Dutch, was for a long time not just a hobby on Ameland, but a means of survival for farmers, traders and other islanders who were dependent on the tides and the weather on the North Sea island. Flotsam and jetsam belonged to whoever found it and after a stormy night this could be anything from Lukas Podolski figures and ropes to wooden beams from which many an islander built a garden shed.

The beachcomber museum is an impressive display of the treasures that the sea has washed up on Ameland’s beaches over the years.

The stories of the ‘beachcombers’ are told through stories and videos that are available in Dutch, English and German.

General information for one week on Ameland

There are over 90 kilometres of cycle paths on the island. If you don’t bring your own bike, you can hire one from various providers. From ladies’ and men’s bikes to children’s bikes, tandems and e-bikes, you can find everything a cyclist’s heart desires.

Fietsverhuur Metz

We opted for two ladies’ bikes, which were waiting for us when we arrived at the ferry terminal in Nes with an employee from Fietsverhuur Metz. He picked up our suitcases so that we could cycle the 10,5 km to our holiday flat without a care in the world.

For the rest of the week, the Metz bikes accompanied us on our tours of the island. When it was time to say goodbye to the island, we left our bikes at the holiday flat and they were picked up again to accompany another family on their holiday.

Rijwielverhuur Nobel

One day we hired an electric scooter from Nobel. The scooter was fully charged and there were no technical problems. However, an introduction to the scooter would have been nice, as none of us had ever sat on a scooter before, let alone driven one.

Coop Supermarket

With only one supermarket in Hollum (where we stayed), you don’t have much choice. So it’s all the more pleasing that the Coop Markt is very well stocked. There is an extensive fruit and vegetable department, a butcher’s shop and a cheese counter that leaves nothing to be desired. The selection of gluten-free foods is much larger than you are used to in German supermarkets. And if you ask nicely 😉 you can get gluten-free bread from the frozen food store, which is a lot less dry than the pre-packed bread on the shelf.

Map for one week on Ameland

How to read the map: Blue is everything in Hollum, green is everything listed above in and around Ballum, purple is everything in Nes (and some additional shops I visited, which can be recommended, but I didn’t take any pictures at) and orange is everything listed above in Buren.

You can save the map to your Google Maps for one week on Ameland by clicking here.

Info for transparency: I’ve been here in the summer, but I didn’t get to writing this post earlier.