News of: Friday, May 27 2005,

Extra trains from Amsterdam to Zandvoort beach

From May 28 to September 4 there will be extra trains between Amsterdam Central Station and Zandvoort beach.

There will be 2 extra trains per hour, between 9.25am and 7 pm.
The last train from Zandvoort back to Amsterdam leaves 0.56 in the night.
The trains take about half an hour, and are a direct connection for which you don't need to change.
The normal train service between Amsterdam and Zandvoort requires that you change in Haarlem.

From the train station in Zandvoort it is just a minutes' walk to the beach.

Zandvoort is the main beach resort for Amsterdammers, about 25 kilometers west of Amsterdam.
The beach is a broad, clean and long sand beach. It stretches along the entire coast of the Netherlands.
Nevertheless, on warm (weekend) days it may take up to half an hour's walk to find a quiet spot, as the beaches can be crowded.
On such days, traditionally traffic jams form, so you are well advised not to try reaching Zandvoort by car. Parking is difficult too.

Detailed train schedule information is on the NS Railways website.
Click on 'English', and fill out 'Amsterdam Centraal' and 'Zandvoort aan Zee'.
(At time of publishing of this article the English page of the website has a bug: after filling out 'From', 'To' and your travel date/time, you get a screen where you must again fill in the correct date of your journey. Otherwise, it assumes you travel 'today', which may not be what you want).

And the weather forecast is here.