Car parking at Schiphol?

[pedalbin]

Are there any off-airport parking companies serving Schiphol airport similiar to those at Heathrow (pink elephant etc)? I have done a search and could only find the official parking which at €50 for a weekend is a bit more than I want to pay.

[ConstantFlyer]

You can park for around EUR 35 for a weekend through smartparkingschiphol.com which is a sort of comparison service for all parking opportunities nearby. For under 7 days' worth of parking, it recommends Service Parking, Sky Park and Quick Parking. (The website is in Dutch, as I suppose it's aimed at locals, but as Dutch is the closest related foreign language to English, it is fairly straightforward.)

Alternatively, park your car in a nearby town or village, and take the excellent, regular and cheap train to the airport.

Hope it works out. Have a good trip!

[Hotel Tango]

but as Dutch is the closest related foreign language to English, it is fairly straightforward

You must be joking ;)

[Capetonian]

Dutch probably is the closest related language to English. That is not to say that it is particularly close or easy to understand, but the statement is true. Most of the Cloggies speak English, not that this will help you much using the website.

[Hotel Tango]

Capetonian, I was actually referring to the "fairly straightforward" part of the sentence.

Indeed the Dutch don't seem to find English at all difficult to learn (same with German btw). They are helped by watching lots of undubbed English/American tv programs and films and motivated by having to conduct business mostly in English. Very young Dutch kids have a surprising good command of the English language. However, I don't think that an English person reading Dutch language text for the first time will have the remotest clue in understanding it. That's what I was aluding to.

[cavortingcheetah]

Perhaps you might find it here?

Schiphol - Parking (http://www.schiphol.nl/Travellers/ToFromSchiphol/Parking.htm)

or you can write to them here in English if you like:

Schiphol - Contact (http://www.schiphol.nl/Travellers/AtSchiphol/Contact.htm)

asking them exactly what you want to know.

The last time I did so was to inquire about specific Cuban cigars at long haul duty free. I had the answer within 24 hours.

The Dutch are extremely funny about Afrikaans. It is not a reciprocated sense of humour.

[Tony_SLF]

Two options;

try joining Privium and get preferred parking, don't know if it's cheaper

or

park around Hoofdorp, the next station south of Schiphol. Parking gets easier as you go on down towards Leiden

You can also park around Duivendrecht and get the train through in around 15 mins. Not advisable if it's a really nice car

Best scam; the hire cars have their own entrance/exit at the back by the taxi lot. there didn't use to be a barrier on it Not easy to describe how to find but if you watch the inbound rentals being taken away for cleaning, you will see it. Same applies to most airports actually

[ConstantFlyer]

Hotel Tango

Do give it a go. I'm sure you'd have no trouble filling in a Dutch form with your 'naam en adres' or your 'telefoon nummer'.

Schiphol comes from schip (= ship) and hol (= hole or hollow), so I understand, as I think Schiphol is the only international airport that used to be a seaport.


Pedalbin

I agree with the other parking suggestions above, especially parking in Hoofddorp (Hoofd = head, main or chief; dorp = village). Shouldn't be a problem just for the weekend.

Beste groeten (= best greetings) - not to be confused with beste groenten (= best vegetables!)

[Smoketrails]

@ ConstantFlyer

What utter tosh! Taking that as an example would mean I could actually manage reading anything but Greek, Arabic and anything Asian with lots of squigly bits in it.

Reading complete Dutch sentences is close to impossible for somebody brought up souly on the English language.

[ConstantFlyer]

I've started a new thread in Jet Blast called Is Dutch easy? http://www.pprune.org/jet-blast/428069-dutch-easy.html#post5945045
to avoid thread drift here from parking near Schiphol.