I will be travelling to Rotterdam mid-January 2011.  How is the weather for hiking in January?  Also, are there hiking routes in and around Rotterdam?

Thanks

Reply:

Thank you for your guestbook entry. The weather in January is very unpredictable. It may be cold, freezing and nice for hiking, but it may as well rain quite lot. You just need to look out of the window and see. I think the main issue is that daylight is a bit short. It's dark till about 8:30 and after 16:30, so this limits the time a bit.

Starting from Rotterdam, there are many hiking tours possible. Rotterdam has very good railway connections, so it's easy to get out. On the page NS Hiking routes South-Holland you can find directions for some nice routes. The nearest one is the Boonevliet route, which is very nice and not too long. It starts near Rotterdam and ends in the nice small town Maassluis.

Another nice route is Bieslandse Bos, which starts in Delft. You go to Zoetermeer, there you can go back to Delft by bus.

Meijendel is a bit longer, showing the dune area and the beach (if you extend the route a bit).

Wish you nice hiking...