hotdutchboys

The Flying Dutch

~By:  Amanda

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When consulting weather.com with the forecast for Amsterdam, just assume the exact opposite. While rain and cold threatened our perfect day, ultimately one could not have asked for a more  perfect sunny day. The concept is genius: ten of the most popular Dutch DJs spinning an invigorating one hour set each, across three cities in the Netherlands (Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Einhoven). A special Flying Dutch helicopter transports each performer in between the three cities for each set. I must give all due credit to our wonderful Flemish friend Sandra for alerting us about this incredible festival in its second year.

Growing up in the United States, one comes to expect a certain amount of chaos associated with a festival or any large event. The disorganization from the beginning to the sideshow which is inevitable  to follow is a characteristic of any event hosted by the red, white and blue.

image1Upon arrival at the Flying Dutch  we were delighted to find neat lines as everyone queued politely to have their tickets scanned and bags searched for contraband. Once inside I highly recommend purchasing a locker, a medium sized locker only cost us 7 euro or 8 USD and stowed five girls’ sweaters and accessories with room to spare. The lockers are controlled by a pass-code which conveniently allows anyone in your party to access them. All transactions inside the festival are controlled by tokens, one can pre-purchase tokens online in advance or inside the festival using cash or card. Each member of my group purchased 50 euro worth of tokens, this supplied us with  currency for beer, food and water for the remainder of the day. While I did not personally partake in the festival food, it did look amazing and far surpassed the typical soggy hot dog or dried out pizza.

The festival is a straight-up stadium house; it’s big, it’s loud, and the giant speakers placed everywhere boomed as each amazing DJ spun a heart-pounding series of peeks and valleys which kept us dancing for hours. Our 2016 line up included

image4As we joined the Amsterdam crowd, I will never forget the reverberations as we walked down into the stadium at exactly 3pm, listening to Tiesto performing Split (Only U). I was so thoroughly impressed with each artist’s set, that I still listen to them periodically on the global-sets.com pod casts. We all wished the night could have continued forever as Armin van Burren ended the festival on such a phenomenal high note that it left everyone’s hearts wanting more.

Port-a-potties: who likes them?? Nobody; have you ever found a clean one?? Apparently this exists in the Netherlands! They had more than enough for the crowd and the wait on average was less than five minutes… what a concept! The only thing I could speak ill about the logistics of this festival is that they ran out of bottled water, first inside the Stadium and then the entire festival. With temperatures reaching over 80 degrees Fahrenheit (27 degrees Celsius) and everyone dancing and drinking alcohol, it is necessary to have excessive water on supply.  Next year I plan to tote a collapsible refillable water pouch which can be refilled, because Dutch water does not contain hepatitis. And with that we left the festival full of inspiration, happiness and a great tan.

image5So how do your find tickets for next year, you must know? If you love EDM and enjoy a wonderful day in amazing company this festival is one to mark on your calendar. The line up alone is outstanding. The festival dates typically fall over an early weekend in June, for 2017 on June 3. Late to the party, as always, our group found out about the festival after tickets were already sold out, but we were still able to purchase 5 tickets for our group of girls a few weeks before the festival using the app TicketSwap. You can follow the Flying Dutch at theflyingdutch.tv or download the app, to receive alerts and check out this years epic highlights. Hope to see you there next year!!!!

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