Description

Price includes:

3 x overnight stay with breakfast (possible dinner, if additional booking)
STO Guarantee
Reservation fee
Tourist tax
Very comprehensive travel documentation (maps and Friesland Travel Guide & Tourist Atlas (four-language travel book, 260 pages)
Free parking of your car or motorbike at hotel

Price does not include:

Travel and cancellation insurance (to be taken out with own insurance company)
Lunch, dinner and drinks

Free cancellation up to six weeks before arrival date
Weather conditions are no reason for cancellation at Friesland Holland Travel and cancellation is always covered by travel and cancellation insurance (to be taken out with your own insurance company).

For whom?
This year-round package is a special all-weather holiday in Friesland. The bases are three good hotels with their own parking and/or storage facilities in the following places: 1. Sneek or Joure; 2. Workum or Koudum; 3. Dokkum or Leeuwarden. Hotel selection is subject to availability of rooms and facilities.

The route takes you past the most important ‘must sees’ and through valuable natural and cultural landscapes. Among other things, you will drive along high dike roads along the IJsselmeer. The Friesland Elfstedentocht by car or motorbike is more than just an introduction to the Frisian Elfsteden: you will also experience Friesland’s countryside.

Starting day
Any day of the week

Start and finish
Hotel on the Eleven Cities Route

STO Garant
This offer is covered by the guarantee of STO Garant. You can find the conditions of this guarantee scheme by clicking here

The Elfstedentocht from day to day

You will receive personalised travel information for each day after booking. In any case, you will be expected at your starting hotel in the afternoon on the first day. After checking in (between 15.00 and 19.00) and moving into your room(s), you will enjoy your first evening dinner in the restaurant on day 1, the day of your arrival in Friesland. You will start your tour of the Eleven Cities the next day (day 2) based on your personal travel programme. Based on this, you can already choose from the many sights and scenic attractions at home. You will find these in the thick travel guide and on the Eleven Cities route map you will receive after booking. On day 2, you will drive from Sneek (the first hotel) via IJlst, Sloten, Gaasterland, Stavoren and Hindeloopen to Workum (the second hotel). On day 3, you will visit Bolsward, Harlingen, Franeker and Dokkum (the third hotel) or Leeuwarden (the third hotel). On the last day, day 4, you will either drive from Dokkum (hotel) via Leeuwarden or from Leeuwarden (hotel) to Sneek. You will then have driven the entire Elfsteden route!

Extra night

If you no longer feel like going home at the end of the last day of your arrangement, Friesland Holland can book an extra night’s stay in the start and finish hotel – or in another Eleven Cities Route hotel – for you. It is highly advisable to book this extra night while booking your package, due to the high occupancy rate of our hotels.

Documentatieset

Wie deze bijzondere reis boekt krijgt direct na boeking een 260 pagina’s tellende A4 reisgids over Friesland en de Elfsteden, compleet met verhalen (in vier talen: Nederlands, Duits, Engels en Frans), veel foto’s en kaarten en alle bezienswaardigheden onderweg. Zo kunt u thuis alvast genieten van al het moois dat Friesland te bieden heeft en kunt u een keuze maken uit de bezienswaardigheden die u graag wilt bezoeken. De inhoud van het informatiepakket dat u na boeking per kamer thuis ontvangt is:

Gasteninformatie. Dit is een belangrijk document dat u zeker bij u moet hebben op reis in Friesland. Het is een persoonlijk reisprogramma met uw logeeradressen, de af te leggen trajecten en de te fietsen afstand per dag. De gasteninformatie dient ook als voucher/toegang tot de hotels die door ons op de hoogte zijn gebracht van uw komst.
Friesland Travel Guide & Tourist Atlas (viertalig reisboek, 260 pagina’s)
Routekaarten met fietsknooppunten
Situatiekaartjes van de Elfstedenroute naar de hotels en weer terug naar de route
Elfsteden stempelkaart (per persoon). Tegen betaling van 10 euro ontvangt u na het volbrengen van de Elfstedentocht van Friesland Holland een op naam gestelde Elfstedenoorkonde
Vakantiepaspoort van Friesland
Boekingsvoorwaarden

About the history of the Eleven Cities Tour and contemporary tours

Once in your life, you must have ridden or sailed the 250 km Elfsteden route. Otherwise you will miss out on the experience of a good part of the Netherlands’ rich history. Nowhere will you find such a varied route as the Eleven Cities Route, world-renowned Frisian heritage, especially since the last Eleven Cities Tour on skates in January 1997.

Arrangements

The travel organisation of Fryslân’s tourism office, Friesland Holland Travel Service, offers a choice of 3- to 8-day Eleven Cities packages with SGR guarantee on its websites. All of these include luggage transport and the fastest breakdown assistance: a top-notch replacement bike immediately!

Exclusive bicycles are also available.

Exclusive bikes

You can do the Eleven Cities Tour on your own bike or on a luxury touring bike or e-bike from Rent a Topbike, Friesland Holland’s bike rental company. The tour operator has its own e-bikes and touring bikes, all top brands, all Elfsteden-proof and equipped with two nice and handy panniers as standard. So no typical rental bikes, but luxury two-wheelers with many gears and manually adjustable handlebars and seat post, such as e-bikes from the Alba Unique series. These are exclusive electric bicycles, co-developed by Friesland Holland and entirely based on Shimano technology. The drive technology is also from this top Japanese brand.

Every stage, every day thrills

Every stage by bike, car, motorbike, sloop, sailboat or cabin motor yacht is a unique experience. For example, you climb terps – five-thousand-year-old residential mounds along UNESCO World Heritage Site Wadden Sea – ten metres high and cycle through the forests and over the cliffs of Gaasterland on the IJsselmeer. The pinnacle of enjoyment is sitting on the terraces in the centuries-old romantic towns or on the shores of one of the many Frisian lakes. And be sure to take a day out for Leeuwarden, the European Capital of Culture in 2018 for good reason!

Theatre on the water

There is theatre on the water every hour of every day all over Friesland: modern yachts, sloops and large traditional sailing ships passing locks and bridges and mooring at the city’s old defensive ramparts. Friesland is Europe’s largest and most versatile water park with facilities for every type of boat, right up to the multi-million dollar yachts of the richest of the rich.

Already 400 years of Elfstedentocht

When the Elfstedentocht was first skated is not exactly known. But people probably skated to the 11 Frisian cities on a single day as early as the 16th century. The official 200 km Elfstedentocht on skates has existed for over a hundred years. The first organised skating tour took place on 2 January 1909; the last on 4 January 1997. Then almost 17,000 people completed the 200 km route within the set time: arrival before midnight. Competition skaters take less than seven hours in favourable weather conditions; recreational skaters have 18 hours. Whether the Eleven Cities Tour can ever be skated again depends on climatic developments.

Tourist Elfstedentocht

Thanks to tourism agency Friesland Holland, you don’t have to wait for three weeks of hard frost to taste the atmosphere of yesteryear: it organises Elfstedentocht tours every day every year. The start and finish of the skating tour are always in Leeuwarden, but for practical reasons (parking, etc.) tourist tours usually start and end in the south of Friesland.

Elfstedenkruisje

To participate in the Eleven Cities Tour on skates, one must be a member of the Royal Association De Friesche Elf Steden and have a starting card.Every participant, who completes the race or tour within the specified time and has collected all the stamps, will receive an eleven-city cross.Only race riders with a maximum excess of 20% of the winner’s or winner’s riding time are eligible for an eleven-city cross.Tour riders must arrive in Leeuwarden before 00.00 (midnight) in order to go home with the coveted cross.The medal was designed in 1909.It has the shape of a Maltese cross with a circle in the middle.This circle contains, in enamel, the coat of arms of Friesland. The inscription reads ‘De Friesche Elf Steden’. In 2009, the association received the designation ‘royal’ and the cross was modified so that the royal crown is also visible.These royal crosses are only awarded after the next tour.

The image of the elfstedenkruisje, the logo, the flag and the name, Koninklijke Vereniging De Friesche Elf Steden, are protected and may not be used or exploited by third parties without the association’s permission.From the year 1909 to date, a total of 56,314 silver Elfsteden crosses have been awarded. This medal can only be obtained by skating the entire Elfstedentocht within the set time limit.

Those who have completed the tour by bicycle, car, motorbike, moped, on foot, by boat or otherwise as part of an Eleven Cities package from Fryslân’s tourism office, Friesland Holland, will receive a personalised certificate upon presentation of a full stamp card and payment of €10.

4-day Elfstedentocht by car or motorbike

Participants

Using breakdown assistance with mobility guarantee?

Total

Description

The Elfstedentocht from day to day

Extra night

Documentatieset

About the history of the Eleven Cities Tour and contemporary tours

Arrangements

Exclusive bicycles are also available.

Exclusive bikes

Every stage, every day thrills

Theatre on the water

Already 400 years of Elfstedentocht

Tourist Elfstedentocht

Elfstedenkruisje

5-day car or motorbike package

4-day cycling holiday: Southern Elfstedentocht

4-day cycling holiday: Northern route + Ameland

5-day Eleven Cities cycling package

4-day Elfstedentocht by car or motorbike

Participants

Using breakdown assistance with mobility guarantee?

Total

Description

The Elfstedentocht from day to day

Extra night

Documentatieset

About the history of the Eleven Cities Tour and contemporary tours

Arrangements

Exclusive bicycles are also available.

Exclusive bikes

Every stage, every day thrills

Theatre on the water

Already 400 years of Elfstedentocht

Tourist Elfstedentocht

Elfstedenkruisje

Related products

5-day car or motorbike package

4-day cycling holiday: Southern Elfstedentocht

4-day cycling holiday: Northern route + Ameland

5-day Eleven Cities cycling package