Volendam, Marken and Edam

It is a working harbour that has been given over to visitors, and how that feels depends on when you arrive. The clearest evidence is not ours, it is the sellers': the best selling coach tour of these villages lists an earlier 8:15 departure among its selling points, in order to, in its own words, beat the crowds. So the crowds are real and they are a question of timing, and the company taking you there says so. The photograph at the top of this page was taken at 12:07 on a Sunday in November and the main street is nearly empty. We have not measured what time the coaches arrive, so no arrival times are quoted here. What is certain is that on a coach your hour is chosen for you, and on the bus it is not.

On the numbers, the four stop tour at 42,34 euros: 6 h 30, rated 4.75 across 6,524 reviews, and it runs in Spanish as well as English. The comparison worth making is against the one that drops Edam, because that one costs 44,62, runs an hour shorter and is rated 4.18. It visits fewer places, takes less of your day and costs more. There is also a 62,93 version of the same four stops rated 3.25, although on four reviews that score means very little.

There is a direct bus from Amsterdam Centraal that takes 32 minutes, and the stop is a 6 minute walk from the harbour. We have not published a fare because the line is run by EBS rather than the national railway, so the national planner shows its timetable but not its price, and Dutch buses charge by distance with OVpay instead of a flat fare. Volendam has no railway station, which is the reason it gets sold as a coach excursion, and the bus is the reason that argument does not hold.

Yes, and it is the thing that makes a self-guided day work. The Volendam Marken Express sails every day, every 45 minutes, and the crossing takes 30 minutes. Ticket offices are at Haven 39 in Volendam and Havenbuurt 19 in Marken. You can take a bike or a scooter aboard for a fee, there is a toilet and free wifi, and it is wheelchair accessible. Children up to 3 travel free and 4 to 11 pay a child fare. Tickets cannot be cancelled. The platform sells the same crossing at 12,01 euros; the operator does not publish a walk-up fare on its own site.

For most people, the tour, and it is not close on convenience. One booking of around 42 euros covers Zaanse Schans, Edam, Volendam and Marken in six and a half hours with a guide and no planning. Doing it yourself realistically means two of those four: the bus to Volendam and the ferry to Marken are easy, but Edam is further out and Zaanse Schans is in the opposite direction, so fitting all four into a day without a car is not a relaxed plan. Go independently if you specifically want to choose your own hours in Volendam, or if you would rather spend a long afternoon in two villages than a short hour in each of four. Otherwise book the coach.

They are a few kilometres apart and almost nothing alike. Volendam is the harbour: painted shopfronts, herring stalls and studios that will photograph you in traditional dress, and it is where every coach stops. Marken is a former island, joined to the mainland by a causeway in 1957, with wooden houses built on mounds, a lighthouse at the end of a long walk, and far fewer people. The ferry operator points out another difference that explains a lot about the architecture: Volendam is Catholic and Marken is Protestant.

Edam is the one most people skip and the only one of the three that is a proper old town rather than a waterfront. It has the cheese market in summer and very few visitors outside it. Note that it is also the stop the shorter tours drop first, so if you want to see it, check the itinerary before booking rather than assuming that a tour of the villages includes it: one of the most sold tours on this route leaves it out.

A coach does all three villages plus Zaanse Schans in between 5 h 30 and 8 hours, which is well under an hour in each but is also four places in one day with nothing for you to arrange. Independently, a full day covers Volendam and Marken comfortably: 32 minutes on the bus, then the ferry across whenever you feel like leaving. Adding Edam without a car makes it a tight day, and Zaanse Schans is in the opposite direction, so in practice doing it yourself means two of the four stops rather than all of them. If seeing all three villages in one day is the point, the coach is the way to do it.