Arnhem; Saturday, 10 August, 2024

I had another nice lie-in and a late breakfast before heading back out into the city, going out via the Korenmarkt which has been so heaving the previous evening, late morning on a Saturday it was deserted so it was possible to take in the very nice architecture of the buildings surrounding the square.

I headed through town and down to the riverside and the John Frostbrug. In 1944, when this was the Rijnbrug it was the key bridge that crossed the Rijn (Rhine) for quite a distance in both directions and was one of the key targets of Operation Market Garden – the attempt by the allies to seize all the important lower Rhine crossings, forcing the Nazi’s to divert resources and push them further back to Germany and whilst the rest of the operation went well the Battle of Arnhem was a total failure on the allies side, resulting in the deaths and capture of many soldiers and affording the Nazi’s their last significant victory in the war. It also lead to the significant damage and destruction across the city that had up until then been spared the worst of the destruction of the war.

Located next to the bridge is a small museum called Airborne Museum at the Bridge – part of the larger Airborne Museum located a couple of Kilometres out of town that tells the history of the whole Operation – this small museum focuses specifically on the battle for the bridge and some of the key figures who were involved, and killed, during the operation.

After looking around the museum I headed out onto the bridge to go for a walk over the Rijn. Renamed in 1977 to the John Frostbrug after the lead commander of the allied forces the bridge was rebuilt to its original design in the late 1940s as it was completely destroyed by the retreating Germans just a few months after the Allies had expended so much Human resource on their failed capture of it.

Heading back into town the bridge leads down to a major roundabout which pedestrians and cyclists are routed down under and into the tranquil Airborneplein, home to the memorial to the battle.

From the memorial I walked back into the old town to stop for some lunch before wandering over to the Trolleybus stop to pick up the bus out to the Nederlands Openluchtmuseum located on the edge of town.

The museum is one of the largest examples of an ethnographic museum with buildings from across the country reconstructed within the museum to give an idea of what life in the past would have been like for the Dutch. As this is the Netherlands it of course includes rather a lot of different types of Windmills.

The site is so large that a tramway has been built that runs in a loop around the museum serving all the different areas, allowing you to quickly move between sections of the site and save on the quite lengthy walks that would be required to see everything. Normally the site closes at 5pm, but on two weekends each summer it stays open until 9pm allowing more time to look around, along with food stalls and cultural events, and by pure fluke this was the last Saturday of the year that the site was open late, so rather than trying to pack everything into 2 hours I had much longer to look around.

I spent a long time exploring the site and I think there were still large sections that I had missed. I took advantage of the food trucks to have dinner on site – at vast expense – before finishing off looking around and then catching the trolleybus back into the centre of town, thankfully dropping me off right by the hotel so it was only a short walk back to my room to freshen up, before a nightcap in the rooftop bar and then bed.