Saying goodbye to Fals Mountain and following the road into the Netherlands, my next destination was Maastricht. This city is the capital of the province of Limburg in the Netherlands, located between Aachen in Germany and Liege in Belgium. It is an ancient city with a long history.
This is my second time coming to the Netherlands. I spent a few days in Amsterdam before and it was a great experience. However, maybe because I have lived in Germany for a long time, I suddenly felt a little uncomfortable when I came to Maastricht this time. The reason is that the price is much higher than that in Germany. For example, a bottle of Coke in Germany costs 1 euro at most, while in the Netherlands it costs 2 euros and 0.7 euros. In Germany, you can buy a 1L box of milk, but in the Netherlands, it costs 0.7 euros. You can only use the public restroom once. They all talk about European integration, but in terms of prices, this country, which is close to German in terms of language, has really shown its miser side. So here’s a tip for you, if you want to visit the Netherlands or Belgium, it’s best to buy food and water in Germany, so you can save a lot of money.
Macheng scenery
But when it comes to the city scenery, Maastricht is indeed more beautiful than Germany. Although it is not big, every brick and tile is more European-style. Take the roundabout in the middle of the road, for example, the roundabout at the intersection here There are so many islands, there is a statue in the center of almost every roundabout, and various statues are also erected on the pedestrian streets in the city center.
maas river
In addition, the Maas River, one of the most important rivers in Europe, also flows through here. Many sand-carrying boats pass by on the river, and there are also many mallards, grebes and other migrating birds that live here. The restaurants along the river were full of Dutch people, no doubt also stifled by the coronavirus restrictions.
Deer and dolphin burger
I was very curious about what the deer dolphin looked like, so I Googled it and found out that this is the deer dolphin.
Unlike Amsterdam, which is brightly lit even in the early morning (maybe the last time I went there was Christmas, and the center of Amsterdam was full of people even in the early morning), here after 8 pm, it is deserted. I stopped in front of a burger restaurant and enjoyed a very special game burger. The meat of the burger is made from an animal called deer dolphin. It tastes pretty good, very close to pork liver.
Maastricht city center market
The weather has been very good these days. The temperature has soared above 20 the next day. It is a bit hot under the scorching sun. The center of Macheng is already crowded with people. Different from the German epidemic prevention, the Dutch are very unrestrained. There is no mask order and they only ask people to keep their clothes on. It's far away, but Europeans who have been holding back all spring rarely encounter such good weather, and they enjoy it more than they are frightened. But looking at the huge crowds, it looks similar to Amsterdam.
Church interior
This Indonesian meat skewer is delicious, but a bit expensive, 5 euros
I saw an Indonesian snack stall at the market and bought three skewers of barbecued meat with curry. It tasted pretty good. There were just too many people, so I went to the church next to the market. I wanted to visit the church. However, due to the impact of the new crown epidemic, the inside was not open, so I could only take a look in the small auditorium on the side.
underground castle
Another iconic attraction of Macheng is its underground castle. This castle is built on a mountainside. The view here is wide and you can see the whole of Macheng. I wanted to enter the underground restaurant of the castle, but unfortunately I waited for a long time. Waiting for the ticket sales staff, but that's okay, I took a look at the ticket price, 12 euros per person, and had to sigh that the Dutch love money too much.
Horse City is not big, so you can spend a day just wandering around. We don’t have much time this time, so we included the Paradise Bookstore, the Gate of Hell and other attractions. During the COVID-19 period, in order to avoid unnecessary trouble, we did not go through to Horse City. It's a pity to cross the northern part of the river to Liège in Belgium.
To be continued…