Hotels near Het Amsterdamse Bos

Het Amsterdamse Bos covers 1,000 hectares, roughly three times the size of Central Park, most of it inside Amstelveen though the City of Amsterdam owns it. It was dug and planted in the early 1930s as unemployment relief work; the war stalled the job and the last tree went in during the 1970s. Around 4.5 million people visit each year, and entry is free. Running through the middle is the Bosbaan, opened in 1937 as the world's oldest artificial rowing course and later widened to 118 metres for eight competition lanes plus a warm-up lane; it hosted the World Rowing Championships in 1977 and 2014.

Amsterdam Dance Event changes nothing out here, which is the whole argument for coming. No stages, no wristbands, no queue. The visitor centre, De Boswinkel at Bosbaanweg 5, opens Tuesday to Sunday from 10:00 to 17:00 and hands out free walking maps, but it closes on Mondays, exactly the recovery day most festival visitors would want it open. October is the real constraint: Amsterdam averages 14°C by day and 7°C at night, with about 82 mm of rain over seventeen days, and sunset falls at 17:13 by the end of the month.

One caveat on arriving romantically rather than efficiently. Heritage tram line 30 from Haarlemmermeerstation serves the park on Sundays only, early April to late October, at €5 single or €7.50 return, and construction has forced a shuttle bus to Jollenpad. Sunday 25 October, the closing day of the festival, is the only ADE day it could plausibly run. Bus 357 goes daily.

Pro Tip: Take bus 357 from Elandsgracht bus station at around 10:30, get off at the Amsterdamse Bos stop, walk the north bank of the Bosbaan to De Boswinkel, and be back in the centre by 14:00 - two hours before Paradiso opens its doors on the Saturday.