One of my favorite nature reserves in the Netherlands is the Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen (AWD). It’s found in the west of the Netherlands between Zandvoort and Noordwijk in the dune landscape near the Noordzee. It’s used for pre-treating two-thirds of the tap water of Amsterdam, but it’s also open for people to have a nice walk in nature. With the many animals and nature found here it’s perfect to walk around with your photo camera. In this blog post I will share my 7 favorite walks in the area.
Visiting the Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen
The Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen has four main entrances, all of them have parking space to park your car. Three of the entrances also have a place to get some lunch or something to drink. Only Parking de Zilk has no options for something to eat or drink. In the nature reserve there are no options at all, so you need to go to one of the three entrances that have an option. If you go to the Parking Oranjekom at about 500m of the entrance you have a visitors center where you can find more information about the nature reserve.
My favorite entrance
My favorite entrance is the one at the Parking Oranjekom, here you have two option on both sides of the road. Although this is most of the time the most popular one, so if you are a little bit late on a sunny day it can be full. My other favorite is Parking de Zilk, this one is a little less busy and I have not seen it completely full. Another option is the one in Zandvoort. Parking Pannenland is my least favorite, it has a quite narrow access road which can be a bit annoying on busy days, where it will be difficult to enter or exit with the possible oncoming traffic.
Visiting the Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen is not free. You always need to pay an entrance fee per person. Also parking is not for free at the four main entrances. But it not that expensive for a visit. At the time of writing it’s €1,50 per person and parking costs are €1,50/h1 (with a max. of €6,00 for a full day) per car. At all entrances there are machines to buy your entrance ticket and pay for your parking. If you think you will go enough to the Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen it’s also possible to buy a year subscription. You can find more information and option to buy on the website of the AWD Waternet.
1 At the time of writing, this was not yet active and still cost €2.00 for a full day. However, this is expected to change sometime in May or June 2025.
Bring your Camera
The Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen is know for the many deer you will find here. In the last years the number of deer have declined but there are still many to spot. It’s very difficult to go and not spot any deer, you will always see them. Even during a shorter hike of about an hour. Or at least that is my experience, I have not been here without spotting any. But there are a lot more animals to spot than only deer. You could spot foxes, pine martens, kingfisher, tree frogs and many more different birds and animals.
With everything you can spot and see it’s good to bring your camera. With your phone you can already make some beautiful photos. Even of the deer it’s possible with a phone, with some it’s easy to come a bit closer and with the tele lens of your phone to make some photos. But some are also a bit skittish, then it’s good to have a camera with you with more zoom and better quality.
I always like to bring my Mirrorless camera and a 100-500mm or 200-800mm tele lens. But if you want to focus a bit more on the landscape a 14-35mm or 24-105mm is also very suitable. But with the short end of your tele it’s also possible to take some landscape photos. But there is also enough to capture when you bring your Macro lens.
Walking in the Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen
With the four main entrances you have many options to start your walk. There are also some smaller entrances but there is no or minimal parking available. In this blog post I will focus on the main entrances.
The Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen is a big nature reserve and you can walk here many kilometers if you want, but also some short routes are at some of the parkings possible. I like the walks of about 10 to 15 kilometers in the area, but I also sometimes like to do some of my shorter ones.
My Favorite routes
My favorite walk is found starting at parking Oranjekom. If you start here you will come across the most diverse nature landscapes in the area. From walks in forest areas, different “mountains” found here or if you walk a bit further almost savanna like areas, there is enough to see here.
The Red ~12 km walk from the Oranjekom entrance is my favorite round in the Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen. It has almost everything you can find here. It starts with a beautiful part along the water channels, that will lead you over paths through more dense forest, followed by some dunes leading to the almost savanna like areas.
For photography and spotting animals also this route has many places to stop for a landscape photo or to spot one of the many animals. The Ridge along the “Voormalige renbaan” is my favorite part. You are walking a bit higher than your surroundings giving you a good view of the area. With also big change to spot any of the animals.
Another one of my favorites routes or in this case you have 2 options, is the Purple ~8,6 km walk from Oranjekom parking or the Blue ~9 km walk from Zandvoort Parking. With both routes you ascend a few of the “highest mountains” of the area. Ok, ok it are no mountains it are just some small hills which are at the highest 36 meters. But I like the path over these hills which give you a good view over the nature reserve. In the distance to the north also a view of Zandvoort. Check the map for all the routes and point of interest.
Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen Map
On the map below you will find the routes and the parking lots. You can use the “All Categories” filter to hide or show the Route colors, this to more easily see how a certain route follows the paths in the Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen. But you can also hide the point of interest, parking lots or restaurant options.
Download GPX Routes
Below in the table you can find some of the routes I created with Outdooractive and liked. In the map above you can see how the routes go through the nature reserve. I split them up based on the starting from the different parking lots. Click on one of the parking lots and find the color of the route you would like to complete. Then click on the download button behind the route or check the route on Outdooractive via the link behind the route. You can also find all routes in a Outdooractive Collection.
- Red: Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen Oase Trail (Download GPX or Outdooractive)
~2h 27m – 10,9km – 44m - Purple: Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen “Mountain” Trail (Download GPX)
~1h 48m – 8,6km – 87m
- Yellow: Walk – Pannenland AWD – 6,7 km (Download GPX)
- Brown: Walk – Pannenland AWD – 8,3 km (Download GPX)
- Blue: Walk – Zandvoort AWD – 9 km (Download GPX)
- Green: Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen de Zilk (Download GPX or Outdooractive)
~2h 34m – 12,6km – 49m - Blue: Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen de Zilk Easy Trail (Download GPX or Outdooractive)
~1h 22m – 6,72km – 16m
These trails are not official marked routes within the reserve. I created them myself, so it’s best to use a GPS-enabled device—like a phone or smartwatch—to follow the GPX track accurately.
Impression Photo Gallery
During my strolls in the Amsterdamse Waterleidingduinen I made already many photos with my DSLR or Mirrorless camera. Below in the gallery an impression of my own favorite photos I made here in all the different seasons.
