Beaches near Amsterdam?

Better let someone from the Netherlands answer this one. Beach resort is not the first thing that comes to mind when discussing the Netherlands. But I do see the resort of Zandvoort aan Zee has trains from Amsterdam Centraal every 30 minutes and its a 30 minute ride.

Scheveningen bills itself as the premier beach resort in the country, reachable by tram from Den Haag Centraal and HS stations.

Never been to either, but I did get 2 hours of sleep at a Holiday Inn in Ijmuiden.

Kathi,, I think from reading your other posts that you are planning to end up in the Nederlands end of May beginning of June?

I wouldn't consider that a time to spend much time at any beach in the Nederlands. Cold as heck water.. and weather could be cool .. or rainy( heck its been cool and rainy for us in mid july.. )

Are you considering venturing into the North Sea? I wouldn't consider it at any time of the year!

Zandvoort is indeed the beach of Amsterdam as Scheveningen is that of The Hague. The sea will still be cold and the chances for spreading your towel and baking in the heat are not too high, but when the sun is out and the wind is low they are nice places to walk along the waterline and have an afternoon drink. Something more adventurous would be to go to one of the islands up north, with Texel the easiest reached (train to Den Helder and then a ferry).
Zandvoort is a 10-minute train ride from Haarlem, and Scheveningen is, as said, an easy tram ride from the centre of The Hague.
Having said that, I don't understand your plan to change hotels between Amsterdam and Haarlem: they are a 15-minute train ride from each other. Staying in Haarlem (or Leiden or Utrecht) is much more relaxed than in Amsterdam.

EDIT:

I had just started an answer and see that Ton from Leiden has said all I wanted to say and more.

Yup.

Thanks all for the help! I just realized that Haarlem is indeed a short train ride from Amsterdam and now am thinking to make that base and day trip from there. We were originally thinking of traveling in May/June, but as I am fine tuning and making decisions, I find that since most of our time will be in Switzerland and Germany, it may be a better idea to travel end of June into July. With that said, I think I am being lured by the beautiful sunny travel photos of Zandvoort. We are from Oregon, thus I am well aware of rainy,cold, windy beaches, lol. No, we don’t want to swim, I was just thinking of sitting on a towel reading a book or sitting on a balcony watching the waves. Just wanting a change of scenery and something different to see I guess.

If you just want to sit there reading a book or so you can sit at an open pavilion on the beach . Just order a cup of coffee or whatever and you can sit there for quite a while . If it's windy those are great as they have glass around them to keep the worst wind out . A lot like a large terrace with glass shields around . If you suddenly get a rain shower you can jump inside until it passes . If you wish to sit in a beach chair in the sand , these pavilions ( really restaurants ) have those in front and even have parasols against too much sun . Waiter may come around asking if you wish to order anything but they don't make pests out of themselves .

Yes, Zandvoort is 10 minutes from Haarlem station with trains every half hour.

Haarlem won't disappoint you. From the city to the beach you cross the dunes, part of which is a national park. Nice for a bicycle ride, which you can rent at or near the railway station. OpenStreetMap shows the paths.

Thank you Ton for the link, we love bike riding so that is very helpful. Do you know if bikes can be rented overnight Incase we decide to spend the night at the beach? I don’t think I will make any hard and fast plans and we will make our plans for the day weather dependent.

I do like the beach pavilion idea as well. But if the weather is crummy,The Hague looks interesting. Would that make a good alternate day trip if crummy beach weather, or are there better recommendations? We love architecture and history, museums not so much.

Again, thank you all for the replies, it makes decision making so much easier!

I don't think it will be a problem to rent bicycles for more than one day, but realise it's only half an hour on the bicycle from Zandvoort to Haarlem.
The Hague (Den Haag) is not best known for its architecture. Leiden (largest historical centre after Amsterdam) or Delft (more picturesque) would fit your interests better. It's all very close to Haarlem: some 20 mins to Leiden and 45 mins to Delft.