The city is very walkable, so don’t stress about spending money on transport around town. Another bonus is that most of the city’s attractions are free, and wandering the city itself is probably first on the to-do list.

Related: 5 Easy and affordable day trips from Amsterdam | A budget guide to Haarlem, Netherlands

Here are some of our best tips for saving on your trip to Utrecht.

Getting there

A roundtrip ticket from Amsterdam Central Station is €14.80 and takes about a half hour each way. And prepare yourself for a busy scene upon arrival: Utrecht Central Station is the busiest and largest station in the country, because it’s a giant train hub.

The station is also connected to a large and somewhat confusing shopping center (parts of which seem to always be under construction), Hooog Catharijne. With more than 200 food joints and stores, however, it’s certainly convenient. Leaving your train, you’ll probably pass through the maze of a mall — stay calm and follow the signs that say “Centrum”. You’ll escape in no time.

Free attractions in Utrecht

Domkerk
Achter de Dom 1
Mon. – Sat. 10 a.m. – 5 p.m. high season, 11 a.m. – 4 p.m. low season

Once you’ve exited the mall madness, spot the giant church tower against the skyline and head that direction to get to the heart of Utrecht. The Domkerk is a mammoth cathedral with grand lancet windows, among other crowning achievements of Gothic architecture.

The 14^th Century tower, located across from the cathedral’s front door, reaches more than 350 feet into the sky. Entry to the church is free, but you’ll need to pay €9 to climb the 465 steps to the top of the tower (reserve at the information center next to the tower). A massive storm destroyed much of the church’s middle section in the 17^th Century, and today it stands in two parts with a well-kept courtyard to wander through. The church is really the landmark of Utrecht, so don’t miss it.

Willibrordkerk
Minrebroederstraat 21
Tues. – Sat. 11 a.m.-  5 p.m.

Willibrordkerk is a hidden gem of a church in the heart of Utrecht. Once you locate its unassuming entrance, head inside, as it’s much bigger and impressive than its exterior might lead you to believe. The Neo-Gothic architecture is complimented by a wrapping of colorful and glittering painted patterns on its arched walls, columns, brilliant ceiling, and floor.

Bloemenmarkt
Janskerkhof
Saturdays 8 a.m. – 5 p.m.

If visiting Utrecht on a Saturday, you’ll have the fortune of experiencing the town’s flower market (Bloemenmarkt). While Amsterdam’s flower market is dominated by tourists and tulip bulbs, the selections in Utrecht have space to show off their blooming, brilliant colors and sweet scents. Free and fabulous for photo ops, it’s worth tiptoeing through these tulips.

Museums

We wouldn’t put any of Utrecht’s museums on the must-see list, especially if you’ll be spending time at the biggies in Amsterdam. However, if your cultural cranium is hungry for a little bit of arts and history, the Centraal Museum is a mish-mash of old and modern art, with a focus on iconic Rietveld contemporary design and passing exhibitions.

Music buffs and historians shouldn’t miss the impressive collection of antique organs, squeeze boxes, and more at the National Musical Box and Street Organ Museum (Nationaal museum van Speelklok tot Pierement).

And the Railway Museum (Het Spoorwegmuseum) is always a hit with kids or any amateur conductors.

Food, nightlife and entertainment

Grabbing a drink along the canal is an Utrecht tradition. Photo: mikecogh

Oudegracht Canal wharfs
Wijnlokaal Aal (Oudegracht 159D)
Chez Willy (Oudegracht 73)
Den Draeck (Oudegracht 114-122)

Much like in Amsterdam, canals wind through Utrecht, creating a city of small bridges and photo ops. However, unlike in Amsterdam, along Utrecht’s central Oudegracht canal the old wharves (and cellars of canal-side factories and mansions) have been transformed into cafes and restaurants with picturesque waterside terraces. Wander the canals and find a terrace that makes you thirsty.

Café Olivier
Achter Clarenburg 6

A great and unique place for a few beer rounds with the locals is Café Olivier. This Belgian beer bar is housed inside a former hidden Catholic church, and its interior is impressively preserved from the 1800s. You’ll find high ceilings, old wooden décor, and a full lunch and dinner menu. Look for it just outside the train station (the entrance is to the left).

Stadskasteel Oudean
Oudegracht 99

Looking for another interesting dinner and drinks option? How about inside a 13th-century medieval castle? The Stadskasteel Oudean is located in the city center, so it’s got it all: canal views, outside terrace, its own brewery, and massive Medieval dining areas.

Cheapo food favorites

The great news for budget travels in Utrecht is that this college town offers an endless supply of food outlets catering to student budgets. While the options are seemingly endless, check out:

• Grand Café Lebowski (Domplein 17 ) has great hearty food and snacks in a restaurant resembling an American hunting club.

• Kimmade (Mariastraat 2) gets great ratings because their Vietnamese food is cheap, fresh and flavorful.

• Meneer Smakers (Nobelstraat 143) is a trendy favorite for towering New York-style burgers served with crispy fries.

Live entertainment

Tivoli is an independent music business that books most of the concerts in town at one of their two locations. From pop to classical and family friendly events, check the site to see what’s on when planning a night out in Utrecht. Depending on the program, admission can be very budget friendly.

Otherwise the Stadsschouwburg theater is where locals go for performance and dance.

Hotel Admiraal is a 10-minute walk from the city center with balcony rooms and modern touches. Photo: Booking.com

Affordable lodging

Generally speaking, the hotels in Utrecht are quite a bit more affordable than those in Amsterdam. This not only makes it a great overnight option for travelers looking to trim their budgets a bit, bit it also makes it an attractive alternative to Amsterdam’s hotel scene. As it’s only 30 minutes by train to Amsterdam’s Central Station, you could easily sleep in Utrecht and “commute in” every day to visit Amsterdam. (The same can be said for Haarlem.)

Search hotels in Utrecht.

Your Utrecht budget tips?

Have a tip for ways to save in Utrecht? Share with us below in the comments section!

The post A budget guide to Utrecht, Netherlands appeared first on EuroCheapo's Budget Travel Blog.

I had studied up on the city’s tram system in advance, and knew that to get from Centraal Station to my hotel, the cute-and-simple Museumzicht next to the Rijksmuseum, I could board either the number 4 or 5 tram at the station and hop off next to the museum. Either of the trams would work just fine, and they both ran on Sunday. But it wasn’t to be.

An unplanned walking tour

Part of the fun of travel are the events, planned and otherwise, that throw off your best planning. On Sunday there wasn’t a 4 or 5 tram to be found at the station. No trams at all, in fact, were running south along my route. It was windy and starting to rain, and the hotel was nearly three kilometers away. Forget about a taxi.

I didn’t have much of a choice but to shrug and literally roll with it, toting my luggage with the masses down Damrak, the tourist-clogged thoroughfare that leads south from the station, getting a wet welcome from the souvenir shops, fry stands and “sex museums” that line the way.

We all rolled on to Dam Square, the heart of the city, which was blinking and twirling on this rainy morning with a fall carnival in front of the palace, its Ferris Wheel and haunted house understandably empty. We continued south along the wide sidewalks of the Rokin. Bikes whizzed past in the rain, and pedestrians dared the unthinkable—walking along the tram lines, which had pretty much fallen silent.

Next time I’ll rent one of these. (Bikes parked at the impressive three-story bike parking garage next to Centraal Station.)

Crowds picked up as I crossed the four canals ringing the center, the Singel (with its flower market), the stately Herengracht, Keizersgracht and Prinsengracht, all lined with beautiful homes and docked houseboats. It was a great way to arrive in the city, even if the wheels on my suitcase were getting cranky.

Finally, at the Stadhouderskade, the busy street lining the Singelgracht canal in front of the Rijksmuseum, a stream of runners from around the world huffed their ways toward the nearby Vondelpark. A crowd of pedestrians watched and cheered on, then crossed the street in a tight pack, flawlessly orchestrated by the police.

I was a bit soggy when I checked into my hotel and hoisted my suitcase up the 67 comically steep steps to my third-floor room. However, it was worth being reminded again that when traveling, all kinds of events can lead to unplanned marathons of your own. Roll with it.

Cruising Utrecht’s canals on Saturday.

A pleasant detour to Utrecht

Of course, I should have known about the marathon. Last month when booking my Amsterdam hotels, I was shocked by the high hotel rates for this past weekend. I was arriving on Friday morning in Amsterdam from New York, but the cheapest decent hotel I could find was more than $300 a night!

There was clearly something happening in the city—so I booked a hotel in Utrecht, a short ride away by train and far cheaper. Thus, I spent Friday and Saturday, the first two days of my trip, getting to know that charming university town, while still able to make daily commutes to Amsterdam to explore.

The view from my balcony at the Hotel Admiraal in Utrecht.

It turned out to be a pretty big money-saver. My room was €95 a night at the art-filled Hotel Admiraal, located in a residential part of town and overlooking a large private garden. The room had a small balcony (along with a Nespresso machine that got a workout).

Granted, €95 is still far from cheap, but it’s much less expensive that what was on offer in Amsterdam, where most remaining hotels were going for more than €250 a night (due to, you guessed it, the marathon). Harlaam would have been an even closer option, but I wanted to find out what a buzzing Dutch university town felt like.

It was cute. I wandered its Saturday morning market, walked the canals, visited the Medieval Domkerk, grabbed a tasty club sandwich at the King Arthur restaurant along the Oude Gracht canal and then hopped on a train to Amsterdam.

Intercity trains from Utrecht to Amsterdam leave every 20 minutes or so, and the journey takes about 25 minutes. At €7.20 each way (plus a €1 fee per ticket), the trips aren’t really cheap, and the country’s “Chipkaart” ticket system is not exactly tourist-friendly (to put it mildly). Just know that: 1) most American swipe-style credit cards won’t work at either the ticket machines or the ticket counter (pay in cash); and 2) you must tap your tickets on the yellow machines in the station to validate them before boarding a train and when leaving (otherwise, well, great shame could fall upon you by a ticket inspector).

The view of the Rijskmuseum from the breakfast room of the Hotel Museumzicht.

Hotel hunting

And thus, yesterday, happily situated in my hotel in Amsterdam’s museum quarter, I started my four-city hotel inspection adventure, one which started with this city’s picturesque canal-side B&Bs, before continuing on to find the best affordable hotels in Munich, Prague and Berlin.

Watch your step! Standing at the top of the stairs at the Museumzicht.

I’m eager to visit and update all of our reviews in these cities, dropping just “ho-hum” hotel listings, while focusing our reviews on the real deals out there. A cheap hotel is easy to find; just do a search and sort by price. However, places that are charming, small, interesting, impeccably kept, central… and affordable? These are a bit trickier to track down.

It’s going to mean a few weeks of climbing steep staircases to reception areas, inspecting bedrooms, snapping photos of bathrooms and trying to read the faces of the guests I pass in the hallways. (Do they seem well rested? Tired? Creeped out by my quizzical stare?)

You can follow along on our Facebook and Instagram pages, where I’m posting photos along the way.

Now, back to hotel inspections. Although this time I might hop on a tram. I hear they’re running!

The post Rolling Along: A Cheapo at Work in Amsterdam appeared first on EuroCheapo's Budget Travel Blog.

In Belgium, it is Brussels that pulls the crowds, and we certainly find the city a great spot to while away a day or two. It can be pricey, so it’s good to remember that rates for the more business-orientated hotels in Brussels plummet on weekend nights.

Beyond the capitals

But there’s more to the Low Countries than merely Brussels and Amsterdam, and we find that the smaller cities in this region better capture the flavor of their respective countries.

Here’s a handful of smaller cities in the Netherlands, any or all of which make a great overnight stay:

+ Middelburg
+ Delft
+ Gouda
+ Utrecht
+ Maastricht

Hop over the border into Belgium, and the following trio really deserves a day or two:

+ Bruges
+ Ostend
+ Spa

Creative travelers can devise smart itineraries, hopping from one small town to the next through the Low Countries. Flanders, Zeeland and Holland are much too good to just speed through on the fast train. These regions boast gentle landscapes of delicate beauty which powerfully influenced local artists from Pieter Bruegel the Elder to James Ensor.

An Amsterdam-bound alternative

European Rail News this week published our preferred route for Amsterdam-bound travelers coming from Paris and London. With a few days to spare, travelers with a zest for adventure can ride from Lille to Amsterdam by local train, bus and ferry, stopping off along the way at three of the small towns mentioned in our list above: Bruges, Middelburg and Delft. Indeed, with only modest detours off that route, one can also take in Ostend (a real heaven for fish lovers) and Gouda (good for more than merely cheese).

Taking time for smaller communities always makes sense. Accommodation is often cheaper than in the bigger cities favored by most tourists, and the chances are that in a smaller place you’ll get a warmer welcome from the locals.

And just now there is very good reason to by-pass the main tourist trail from Brussels to Amsterdam. The posh new train service called FYRA, launched last month to bring high-speed style to that route, has ground unceremoniously to a halt. Apart from the premium Thalys service (which carries hefty supplements for rail pass holders) there are at present simply no direct trains from Brussels to the Netherlands. Good reason, therefore, to think about inventive alternatives.

The post Holland and Belgium: Consider smaller destinations beyond the capitals appeared first on EuroCheapo's Budget Travel Blog.