‘s Hertogenbosch!

Last week, my friend and I decided to visit ‘s Hertogenbosch as part of my goal to visit twelve cities in The Netherlands. Both my friend and I hadn’t been to ‘s Hertogenbosch before, so we took a tour. I found an online tour on youropi.com and I highly recommend it. The tour takes about two hours and it takes you to things you’d otherwise have missed out on.

The tour starts at ‘s Hertogenbosch Station, but because it is almost carnival, it’s also named Oeteldonk Centraol. During our tour through Den Bosch, I once again realised carnival isn’t my kind of party.

The first thing on the tour is this statue of a dragon in the middle of a roundabout. It’s got a story attached to it, but I will save you the details (in case any of you want to do the tour).

After the dragon, you have to walk down the street to get to this bridge. The walls on the other side of the bridge (which you can’t see) are part of the original city walls. Part of them are begin restored.

 

The reason why I took this picture, is because it says ‘Vischmarkt’ on this house. The thing is, though, that this street has had more than one name. In the years, the street has had multiple functions and with every change, the name of the street also changed. It’s called Vischmarkt (or Vismarkt, the modern way to write it) because it used to be a fish market.

The statue of Zoete Lieve Gerritje. The tour has some really interesting information about this statue, so check it out. The only thing I don’t like about this, is the writing on the wall. I think it stands out and doesn’t really fit.

Alright, to be honest, this shop wasn’t part of the tour. But you walk right past it and I really recommend you to take a look inside. It’s an antique store and has many interesting things. I didn’t buy anything, but it was worth a look.

Somewhere in the tour, it says that a house used to be three houses somewhere in the past and that it’s still visible where the original windows used to be. We had a little trouble understanding what they meant, but the square you can see in the photo, used to be a window. It’s now bricked in.

Random moustache on a brick wall. Also not part of the tour.

 

The massive town hall. I like the way this looks, very old and static. If you’re here when the clock strikes whole, make sure you pay attention to the little black square under the triangle.

Statue of the painter Jeroen Bosch. I mostly know him from that one line in a song from Boudewijn de Groot.

The St. Jan’s cathedral. The tour explains why it has three colours, because the white in the right and the red at the left are also part of the building.

And as the last picture, the inside of St. Jan’s cathedral. I couldn’t get the photo any clearer, so this’ll have to do. The inside is really very beautiful, so definitely check it out. I’ve been in many churches and some are more spectacular than other (obviously St. Peter’s basilica in Rome is still the most impressive one I’ve ever seen) but the St. Jan’s is really worth a look.

And that concludes the day we’ve spend in ‘s Hertogenbosch. I love how the city feels like it’s a small town with narrow streets and silent waters, but it also has impressive buildings that are worth a look. Since it’s a big town, it also has a lot of shopping opportunity and ‘s Hertogenbosch could easily satisfy your need for a day trip.