4 Easy Ways to Rent a Boat in Giethoorn, Netherlands
Giethoorn is known as the “Venice of the Netherlands” and for good reason, with its charming canals, quaint footpaths, and an incredible 176 bridges! The village is only accessible by foot, bicycle, or boat, with boat being by far the most preferred option for its 2600 residents.
Needless to say, you should rent a boat in Giethoorn for the best views of this fairytale village with no roads.
This article will take you through all of the best Giethoorn boat rental options, including how to navigate Dutch-language websites for the best deals.
Fun fact: My husband grew up in a small Dutch town near Giethoorn and did field trips there with his elementary school. How cute is that?!
Disclaimer: Girl Gone Wandering is a reader-supported site. Purchases made through genuinely recommended links may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. Learn more.
How to Rent a Boat in Giethoorn
There are 4 easy ways to rent a boat in Giethoorn.
If you’re visiting Amsterdam and have limited time or access to transportation, you can book a day tour that covers transfers to and from Amsterdam and boat rental in Giethoorn.
If you can get to Giethoorn yourself, you can rent from a wide range of boats on English websites starting from 2 hours to a entire day. You can also take a canal cruise and enjoy the sights without worrying about steering the boat.
However, my top recommendation is to rent a boat in Giethoorn with a Dutch-language website. This is by far the most cost-effective way if you can get to Giethoorn yourself and are open to using Google Translate to navigate non-English websites.
Option 1: Book a Giethoorn boat tour
Traveling to the Netherlands from abroad and on a tight schedule? Don’t want to take the train? Don’t want to rent a car? Then the easiest way to see Giethoorn is to book a day tour from Amsterdam.
Giethoorn is relatively difficult to reach by public transportation. The village is 120km away from Amsterdam and it takes about 2.5 hours and at least 3 transfers before you get there.
Driving is faster, but there’s not much need to rent a car in a well-connected country like the Netherlands, especially when parking is €7.50 per hour in Amsterdam city center!
Therefore your easiest option to see Giethoorn by boat from Amsterdam is to book a tour.
When traveling in Europe, I recommend using online tour aggregator GetYourGuide. GetYourGuide is a European company and has one of the most comprehensive lists of short tours around Europe.
This saves you the time of researching individual tour providers yourself. You pay the same price as you would if booking directly with the tour company on the ground, but you also get the additional benefit of 24/7 customer service and refunds if you’re unhappy with your tour experience.
Giethoorn boat tour prices start from €75 per person and includes transfers to and from Amsterdam. Tickets can sell out quickly especially for the summer months so book in advance.
The most popular and affordable tour is a full day trip from Amsterdam to Giethoorn, including bus transfers, a photo stop at the Afsluitdijk, and a 1-hour Giethoorn canal cruise.
There are also tour options that give you a chance to drive a boat, or visit the traditional fishing village of Volendam and the windmills at Zaanse Schaans.
Explore the best options for a Giethoorn boat tour at GetYourGuide!
Option 2: Rent a Boat on an English Website
If you can arrange your own transportation, then you can book a boat in Giethoorn to pick up once you arrive.
The Giethoorn Tourism website has a convenient online booking system in English with a large choice of boats that you can rent.
You can choose how many people are in your party, what type of boat you want, and how many hours you want the boat for. You don’t need a boating license for any of these boats due to their speed.
The most commonly rented and least expensive boat (that you don’t row yourself) is a 4-person “whisper boat”. The Giethoorn Tourism website offers whisper boats starting from €39 for 2 hours or €90 for an entire day (until 5:30pm), and there is an additional €5 booking fee.
These boats are called whisper boats because of their silent electric motor. Note that the basic option doesn’t have seat cushions or a steering wheel – you steer with the motor.
You can of course choose a more luxurious boat with a steering wheel, cushions, pillows, and backrests. However, you’ll notice that the most locals have basic whisper boats parked at their private docks, so go for the most basic option for the most authentic experience!
You can see all of the boat rental options on the Giethoorn Tourism website here.
However, before you go ahead and book, consider that you can save 20% on your Giethoorn boat rental by booking on a Dutch-language website. All you need is Google Translate.
Option 3: Rent a Boat on a Dutch Website
Whenever I visit Giethoorn, I use a website called Boot Huren Giethoorn which means “Boat Rental Giethoorn”. They have the best prices for renting a boat in Giethoorn and I always this website to visitors.
4-person whisper boats start at €45 for 3 hours or €75 for an entire day (until 5:30pm), and there is no additional booking fee.
So you pay €95 on an English website but €75 on a Dutch website for the same kind of boat! That’s a 20% difference!
Boot Huren Giethoorn has a variety of boats that you can rent, as well as options for coffee, tea, juice, picnic baskets, or full meals that you can add on to your booking.
While minimum rental times for your own boat are a longer than the 1-hour guided Giethoorn canal cruises, I guarantee that you’ll have plenty to do between swimming in lakes and sailing through the scenic village outskirts.
How to translate a Dutch-language website
To understand the Boot Huren Giethoorn website, you’ll either need to copy and paste the content into Google Translate, or use an in-browser translation option, which most browsers have.
Google Chrome and Safari have Google Translate built into their system. Firefox supports a Google Translate add-on. All you need to do is to right-click anywhere on the page, select “Translate to English” and all of the text content immediately turns into English!
Option 4: Take a Canal Cruise
If you’re prefer not to operate your own boat, you can take a 1 or 2-hour canal cruise instead. The canal cruise boats are covered and heated, so it’s a great option if you’re visiting in the wintertime or if the forecast calls for rain.
Prices for canal cruises start at €12.50 for everyone aged 12 and over, €8.50 for children aged 3 to 11, and are free for children 2 and under. There is room for about 20 to 30 people on Giethoorn canal cruises.
There are also luxury canal cruise options where you can book your own boat with a private skipper and charcuterie boards and drinks served on board. These packages start at €695 for 2.5 hours and up to 4 people.
The Giethoorn Tourism website has booking options for canal and luxury cruises as well.
Giethoorn Boat Rental FAQ
How do I get to Giethoorn?
Giethoorn is located about 120km from Amsterdam in the northern part of the Netherlands. The area is marshy and full of shallow lakes, waterways, and farmlands where cows greet you as you sail by!
By car
The easiest way to get to Giethoorn is by car. It takes about 1.5 hours to reach Giethoorn from Amsterdam and parking is free almost everywhere.
Giethoorn has a system called “P-Route” that you can follow to clearly labeled parking lots, all of which are free and located a 5 minute walk from a restaurant or boat rental facility.
That being said, if you’re visiting from abroad, there’s not much need to rent a car. The Netherlands is well-connected by public transport and it’s very expensive to park in cities (think €7.50 per hour in Amsterdam city center!)
By public transport
If you don’t have and don’t want to rent a car, you can also reach Giethoorn by public transportation. However, it is rather time-consuming.
To get to Giethoorn from Amsterdam, you take one train from Amsterdam Centraal to Almere Centrum, another train from Almere Centrum to Steenwijk Station, and then a bus from Steenwijk Station to Giethoorn.
Or, there is a train that goes directly from Amsterdam Zuid Station to Steenwijk Station, where you can then take a bus to Giethoorn.
There are also buses to Giethoorn from Zwolle Station. Meppel Station is also close to Giethoorn, but there are no direct buses.
Google Maps will give you the best route, but overall, it will take you about 2.5 hours to get to Giethoorn from Amsterdam. If you don’t want to wait for a bus, there’s a taxi stand outside of Steenwijk Station where you can hail a cab. The ride is only 10 minutes, so it won’t be too expensive!
By bike
If you’re feeling particularly Dutch, you can even bike to Giethoorn. Even though biking from Amsterdam is a stretch, you’re able to take bicycles on trains from 9am to 4pm and 6:30pm onwards on weekdays and all day on weekends.
You could take your bicycle on the train to Steenwijk Station and then bike the rest of the way to Giethoorn. It’s a flat route of about 7km and will take you about 30 minutes.
And if none of the above options are feasible or appealing, you can always book a day tour so you can fully enjoy your time in Giethoorn instead of worrying about transportation.
I have an entire article on how to get to Giethoorn here.
What kind of boats are available for rent?
There are a lot of different types of boats that you can rent in Giethoorn. The choice is yours depending on how authentic of an experience you want to have, how much exercise you want to get, how comfortable you want to be, and what the weather is like when you visit.
“Whisper boats” are the type that you’ll see the most. They’re named as such for their silent electric motor. With these boats, you use the engine at the back of the boat to steer and you can rent them with or without seat cushions. You’ll see mostly whisper boats without cushions docked at the homes of local residents.
Console boats are electric boats with steering wheels. These come with padded seats and are more expensive to rent compared to whisper boats.
If you’re feeling adventurous or it’s arm day, you can rent a “sailing punter” or a “traditional punter” – essentially a gondola like the ones you see in Venice.
You can also rent a canoe, a kayak, a stand-up paddle board, or a water bike.
How much do Giethoorn boat rentals cost?
4-person whisper boat without cushions start at €40 for 2 hours or €95 for a full day on an English website. However, this same boat costs only €75 on a Dutch website! You also have to consider the cost of getting to and from Giethoorn.
Alternatively, you can book a Giethoorn boat tour from Amsterdam for €75 all-in and not have to worry about separate costs.
What is the best boat rental in Giethoorn?
Everyone will have a different opinion about what the best boat rental in Giethoorn is. The best Giethoorn boat rental aggregators are:
- Giethoorn Tourism website
- Boot Huren Giethoorn (in Dutch)
At the end of the day, don’t worry too much about the boat. So long as you get yourself on a boat on a canal in Giethoorn, you’ll have an amazing day.
How long should I rent a boat in Giethoorn for?
Even though I provide options for 1-hour canal cruises, my recommendation is that if you have the time and don’t need to be reliant on a tour group for transportation, you should definitely rent a boat in Giethoorn for an entire day!
There is much more to see and do than a 1-hour guided boat tour allows. There are several shallow lakes that you can sail to and go swimming. The water is calm and only up to your waist so it’s very warm and relaxing to float in during the summer.
There is a pavilion on the lake where you can park your boat and go for a drink, many restaurants along the main canals in the village, marshy fields that you can sail through where cows will come greet you as you pass by. There are even floating ice cream stands!
How early do I need to book a boat in Giethoorn?
You may know that Amsterdam is so popular that more tourists (19 million) visit Amsterdam every year than there are people in the Netherlands (17 million).
Many of these millions of tourists come to the Netherlands during tulip season (April) and summer months, so if you’re planning on visiting Giethoorn during these times, it’s best to book early as possible. That being said, the Netherlands is a popular destination year-round, so it’s always good to book early.
I hope this guide will help you rent a boat in Giethoorn and see all of the sights the Dutch fairytale village has to offer!
If you liked this guide, you may also like what I share on Instagram @gracegonewandering.
I live in Amsterdam with my husband and am always sharing where to eat, what to do, where to go.
2 comments