A weekend in Rotterdam

Three of my classmates from Sweden had been planning a weekend away together for some time and I was lucky that it coincided with my trip and that they invited me along. This gave me the chance to catch up with a classmate that I hadn't seen since our graduation in Sweden (2014) as well as the opportunity to see another city on my 'European Tour'.

Our time in Rotterdam was brief but left a positive impression though there is no denying that it is a pretty expensive destination. We had a short visit - arriving in the afternoon on Friday (September 13) and leaving around 2 pm on the Sunday (September 15). Our major touristy activity was taking advantage of a free walking tour that lasted 3 hours (versus the promised two) which may have been too long for some but suited me fine.

Here are some of the things we saw while walking around on our own before the tour started.

The block-ish building on the left is called The Rotterdam and the building on the right (above the red building) is the Erasmus Bridge

Another view of the skyline

Classmates enjoying the sunshine (and some birds and a guy that photobombed us) 

Street scene - lots of opportunities to eat and drink outside

Beautiful detail on building

Interesting architecture

St. Paul's Church - apparently it is supposed to resemble/represent a diamond

Seen on the Tour

Rotterdam's famous 'cube houses'

As our tour guide (Peter) was quick to point out Rotterdam has a long and quite proud history of copying what other places have done. The cube houses are a good example - they may have been partially inspired by the cube houses of Habitat 67 in Montreal and definitely were based on earlier cube houses built in the Dutch city of Helmond.

Rotterdam's White House is a privately owned building with some lovely statuary

The Witte Huis (White House) was built in 1898 and at one time was Europe's tallest building.

Stained Glass inside the City Hall

The City Hall had several pieces of sculpture

We were lucky that our Saturday tour coincided with 'Open Monument Days' and so we went inside City Hall which is usually closed on a Saturday and only viewable from the outside then. Not only did we get to use the extremely elegant toilets but we enjoyed free coffee, tea and cookies.

Currently Rotterdam's most (in)famous piece of public art - it's Santa with a Christmas tree (obviously) - what do you see?

We had a lot of laughs, some good discussions about where our separate lives have gone since graduation, a good dinner at a bustling middle Eastern restaurant and enjoyed some tasty take-out in the pretty garden of the Air BnB. All too soon it was time to leave but I hope we might do something similar in another city with more classmates invited in the future.

A final couple of pictures - as it was open monuments day on the Sunday too I got a peek inside the Royal Waiting Room at Amsterdam Central train station (which I passed through on my way back to Bielefeld) where members of the Royal Family of Netherlands waited for trains (rather than mixing with the hoi polloi I presume). Unfortunately I did not have time to stay for the tour.

Interior of the waiting room with loads of beautiful wood paneling and stained glass galore

Imposing entrance to the Royal Waiting Room