The brewery I had my eye on today is in Rotterdam, about 25 km from The Hague. I hit the road around 10 a.m.—a perfectly reasonable hour for chasing beer, I’d say. That gave me a couple of hours to get there, which was plenty of time for a detour through Delft. And yes, that flashback I had in Haarlem was actually from Delft. When I reached the main square, it clicked—déjà vu confirmed.
Last time I was in Rotterdam, I tried to find the only bit of the city’s old historic center that survived the WWII bombings. Somehow, I missed it back then. This time, armed with slightly better research, I found it. No wonder I missed it before—I was looking for something medieval, but what I found was more… prewar-modern, not exactly time-travel material.
As for the brewery—well, it was a bit of a letdown. It wasn’t a real brewery, more like a beer stand in a food hall pretending to be one. The beer was good, but the vibes? Not so much.
Shortly after leaving the “brewery,” I collided with another cyclist. My handlebar caught her jacket, and I went flying. Fortunately, just a few scratches and a bruised knee—nothing dramatic enough for a hospital selfie.
Undeterred, I carried on with gusto. It was sunny, albeit windy—but the wind was in my favor. My original destination was Oosterhout, but somewhere along the way, I decided to push on to Tilburg. Why Tilburg? Because the next brewery was there, and I found a campsite basically in the middle of town. Win-win.
I dropped my bag at the campsite and headed to the Koningshoeven monastery, home of the La Trappe brewery, where I enjoyed a couple of their beers. It was the first Trappist brewery on my itinerary.
Back in Tilburg, I attempted to set up my tent. It took a few minutes to remember how, since it had been nearly three years since I last used it. Just next to the campsite was a fair—complete with rides, music, and general mayhem—that kept the neighborhood lively well into the night.
Today in numbers:
117 km – distance cycled
178 m – elevation gain, because the Netherlands doesn’t do hills
438 million – tons of annual cargo at Rotterdam’s port, making it Europe’s #1