Painting the town orange

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This was published 15 years ago

Painting the town orange

Birthday bash ... Queen Beatrix tries her hand at salsa.

Birthday bash ... Queen Beatrix tries her hand at salsa.Credit: AFP

If you're a party animal or a bargain hunter, try to be in the Netherlands on April 30. If you're not, arrange to be somewhere else. Each year on Koninginnedag or Queen's Day, it's as if the entire Dutch nation dresses in orange and paints the town red.

Koninginnedag celebrates the Queen's birthday - former Queen Juliana, that is, not present monarch Beatrix. Yet this is overwhelmingly a people's party. On Koninginnedag it's open slather for garage or car-boot sales, street performers and cafes hosting live music, all in the national colour.

We start with an early morning trip to the world's biggest garage sale, along Amsterdam's wide Apollolaan (Apollo Lane). Anyone with a collection of Abba on vinyl, antique skis or a souvenir tribal mask from Uganda is there, trying to offload it. The Apollolaan is one of Amsterdam's best addresses, so we expect this flea market to sell a superior class of fleas. We're in the market for a child's travel cot and locate one within minutes. It's a terrific bargain but how to get it back to our accommodation? On Koninginnedag, many roads are blocked to cars and the trams are not so much "running" as crowd surfing through the packed streets, their bells ringing constantly. It's a long walk but there's plenty to see along the way.

Vendors, many having staked out a pitch the night before, try to outdo each other by wearing outrageous orange costumes or silly hats. There are orange wigs, cowboy hats and feather boas and inflatable orange crowns, cheeses and windmills worn as headgear. If you haven't brought one with you, don't worry - someone will sell you one.

Suitably stupidly attired in orange T-shirts with absurd inflatables on our heads, we reach the famous Vondelpark in the centre of town. The park is traditionally devoted to children's activities on Koninginnedag. Under the shady trees, children try to sell their surplus Buzz Lightyear and Teletubbies videos to the hordes. Every child who's ever learned a tune is busking, some of them displaying precocious ability. Others show less talent but still get money for effort and looking cute.

Children who can dance and those who can't strut their stuff on a sheet of orange plastic. They run coconut shies, or brace themselves to have eggs thrown in their faces, or sell biscuits and orange juice (with a shot of vodka if you want - Dutch liquor licensing laws are relaxed on Koninginnedag). There are inventive games of chance, such as betting on whether the beetle on a modified ouija board will crawl to the picture of George W. Bush, Barack Obama or Osama bin Laden.

Our vote for most original and entertaining event goes to Amsterdam's Cheapest Skydiving. Children put on goggles and are strapped into a chair with a large bunch of balloons attached. Three young attendants then give the customer a simulated near-death experience. One blows air into the client's face through a tube, another shakes the chair around in a way calculated to resemble turbulence, while a third scrolls hand-painted pictures first of sky, then of rapidly approaching ground, in front of the daredevil's eyes. Is there any better thrill to be had for a euro (about $2)?

Each year the Dutch royal family visits towns across their kingdom; residents turn out in force to entertain them with a series of displays and performances. The royals pride themselves on their informal relationship with their citizens. Queen Beatrix and her family walk around the chosen town, shaking thousands of hands and stopping to join a bongo-drum band of local schoolchildren. They slip into a church for a brief organ recital and a concert by a local opera singer. Back outside, Crown Prince Willem-Alexander and his popular wife, Maxima, strap on blades and skate with the locals, occasioning warm applause.

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In the late afternoon there's one more excursion we need to make, into Amsterdam's canal belt. Spring has already sprung and we're unusually lucky to have fine weather. Amsterdam looks even more lovely than usual, with the trees wearing their new green growth and the river of orange-clad humanity flowing underneath. The canals are packed with boats; the boats are packed with orange partygoers waving to other orange people on the bridges. The Heineken is flowing freely and the volume dial of every sound system is turned up.

At night the party crowd move on to the Museumplein behind the Rijksmuseum, where bands play into the night and the orange crowd rocks on.

All in all, it's a right royal day, a day of the people, for the people and by the people, the only major cost to the state being the clean-up afterwards. This being scrupulously hygienic Holland, cleaning is handled with amazing efficiency. By the time we walk back through the Vondelpark in the evening, the garbology team has done its job.



Singapore Airlines flies from Sydney to Amsterdam via Singapore from $2583 return.
Joining the Koninginnedag festivities is free (not including food, drink and carry cot).

Staying there

For numerous accommodation options and further tourist information, see amsterdam.info or iamsterdam.com. Recommended establishments include: The Quentin Arrive, double from EUR70 ($136.90), see www.quentinhotels.net;
Tulips B&B, opposite Vondelpark, rooms from EUR80, see hostelsamsterdam.com; 't Hotel, rooms from EUR145- EUR220, see thotel.nl.

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