Haarlem // Bike Riding to the Beach

We had a weekend free and decided to exploring Haarlem for the day with a new friend from the Fulbright program. Haarlem is usually about 15 minutes west of Amsterdam and 45 minutes  north of Delft, but of course we didn't check the train schedule before leaving and ended up getting stuck outside of the city due to repairs on the train. We ended up taking a charter bus to Haarlem and it was quite the adventure. It was a blustery fall day and we were not prepared for the chilling, 9 degrees C temperature. We got coffee and lunch in a sweet little cafe on the square, Grand Cafe Brinkmann, which had THE best pesto grilled chicken toasty I've ever had. Then because we were wimps we went to H&M and got gloves, hats and scarves, then walked around town a bit. After a while we decided to rent bikes from Rent A Bike (who hooked us up with sweet bikes and gave us a discount since it was late in the afternoon) and biked out to the beach! It was a beauty ride through neighborhoods and marsh and the beach itself was stunning. We stopped for a beer and some croquets at a beach cafe, Parnassia aan Zee, which was the perfect place to soak up the sun before riding back to town