Where to stay to visit Delft - Delft or Rotterdam?

Personally think Delft is more interesting since it is close to be original. Rotterdam is interesting for it architecture since it was completely rebuild in a modern style since WWII. When WWII ended Rotterdam was about 10 feet of rubble since it was the focus of dozens of booming raids. I like the city but it is not old Europe.

The Vermeer Centrum Delft contains no original Vermeer paintings. However, if you are a fan of Vermeer it is still well worth the visit IMHO. They also have reproductions of all known Vermeer paintings in one room. A short train away (15 minutes?) is the Mauritshuis museum in The Hague that contains three Vermeer paintings—including The Girl with a Pearl Earring and View of Delft.

I have not been to Rotterdam, but really enjoyed our time in Delft in April 2022. It's a nice quiet town to walk around which might be good at the end of your long trip. I went to the Vermeer Center and found it very interesting. There are no originals there, but they have a print of every one of his works. They have a very helpful audio guide to explain the different works. We had an excellent dinner, at a reasonable price, at Spijshuis deDis Fahulous, which we found in the RSE book.

We were on a RSE tour and stayed at Hotel De Plataan. The location was excellent, and each room is uniquely furnished. I think their rates would fit in your budget. www.hoteldeplataan.nl

Gary

We just returned from our trip to the Netherlands and Belgium. We stayed two nights at the Hotel Arsenal in Delft (a Steves recommended Hotel). It was very nice and an interesting building. It is also a short walk to the train station and about 10 minutes to the center of town. We enjoyed our stay there. It is close or in your budget depending on the rates in November.

We also made dinner reservations at Postkantoor Delft and had a very nice dinner there. Delft is a lovely town - we went to the history museum, did Rick’s city walking tour, and went to the Delft factory and enjoyed their tour more than I expected.

I have not been to Rotterdam, but we did a day trip to Delft a few months ago (February) and loved it. So relaxing and laid back. We went to the Royal Delft Factory & Museum and figured we would spend a little bit of time there. It was really good, and we spent much more time there than we anticipated. It is just two short films, which are fascinating, and then you walk through the factory on your own. I did buy a few things and had them shipped, and that whole process was very easy, FWIW.

We stumbled upon Monastere restaurant in the square just as they were opening. The owner went above and beyond. The bar was opening, and had small bites, which was fine with us, but he checked with the kitchen and then insisted to us that we dine in the dining room. So they opened for us for dinner 1 1/2 hours before the usual time. The food and service were both excellent and I would go back in a heartbeat!

We just stayed in Delft on a RS Tour. It's a darling town. When we were there we visited De Candelaer one of only two geniune remaining handpainted Delftware companies. (Everything else you see is print transferred, then somebody puts a brush stroke on it, and they call it handpainted Delft.) Anyway, I was so glad to learn about authenic Delftware at this small shop and it's a wonderful family team.

If you stay in Rotterdam, I suggest taking the water taxi to Kinderdijk. Also relaxing to walk around. You only need to buy a ticket for the windmills if you have interest in going inside or touring the museum, etc. but if you just want to stroll along the walkway of the 19 windmills, there's no ticket required.

We just did exactly this - spent our last two nights of a 2-plus week trip in Delft then took the train to Schiphol on the morning of our flight. We stayed at the Hotel Arsenaal - very near the train station and very interesting inside. Easy walk to see all of Delft and nice breakfast. It's a bit of a splurge, but kind of nice at the end of a tiring trip. We mostly walked around enjoying the scenery and taking pictures, though we did visit both churches and climb the steeple of the Nieuwe Kerk.

We ate asian food at Restaurant Lychee right next to the hotel which was very good, and we got in without a reservation, but they were very, very busy, and then had a final dinner at Cafe Brasserie Monastere. Splurge on their bread, butter and salt service! That was the best bread ever.

I spent part of a day in Rotterdam and that was enough for me. It was bombed to smithereens in May 1940 so most of the city center is post war build. I was with a Road Scholar group that did a walking tour in the Delfhaven area which escaped the bombing and is also where the Pilgrim Fathers started their journey to the US which might not be particularly interesting to you, lol. We ate lunch at the Markt Hall which is essentially a giant food court. I also walked thru the Cube Houses (interesting if you are in to architecture) and saw the Oude Haven (Old Harbor) where I was told people immigrated from in the 1700's.

Another year I stayed 2 nights in Delft on a Rick Steves tour and enjoyed it's charm much more.

Amsterdam?
Leiden?

Thanks everyone for the suggestions. It has cemented my view that Delft looks like a good place to decompress before our trip home. We find that we need some quiet time to prepare for the 32 hour trip back to Australia.

Amsterdam?
Leiden?
The Hague?

We have been to Amsterdam twice for 5 days each time. It's not our favourite city as I have mobility issues and dodging cyclists was stressful.

Leiden looks interesting but is probably too close to Schipol. Delft has been on our list of places for a decade now and we keep missing it. Last time we were in Amsterdam we planned to visit both The Hague and Delft in the same day and we got so caught up in the Mauritshuis and Geemeentemuseum in The Hague that we ran out of time for Delft. We feel that, as lovely as The Hague is, it's not a major priority for this trip.

This time around we are considering whether we can fit in a quick trip to Kinderdijk as we have also missed doing that twice now because of bad weather. Leiden looks a bit far to easily do this from and still see Leiden.

We spent several days in Delft last year, and very much enjoyed it - both by itself, but also as a place to radiate out from to other places (Rotterdam and The Hague plus the countryside).

We stayed at the Hotel De Plataan (a RS recommendation) and the location was very good and the breakfast was tasty but man oh man were we unimpressed with the "themed" rooms. Ours was an Egyptian theme, and gotta say...it was not so great. I'd like to check out the "normal" rooms, before giving the hotel a bad review - especially since the location, staff, breakfast, etc., were nice.

We found lots to see and do that was low key in town. We ate at several places along canals for tasty food and some good beers. We did the RS stroll - very easy and brief. We shopped/browsed a little at some small shops, and it was a pretty medium-sized "central" town with some outer sections we explored by bike on our daily rides (including to Rotterdam).

Rotterdam was completely different from Delft, but our time wandering there was fun too. We did the RS walking tour there as well. We especially enjoyed the modern architecture including paying a couple Euros to go up in the Cube-shaped houses. Plenty of things to see and do, some tasty food as well. The waterfront was also more "active" for sightseeing than the lazy canals in the smaller towns/cities like Delft.

I'd still choose a place like Delft over a place like Rotterdam for a "wind-down" couple of days. I love cities, but Delft definitely had more of a relaxed feel to it, and - in May last year - more outdoor cafes with canal side seating than we could visit. :) We "wasted" many hours just snacking and drinking by those canals. Really good times.

AussieNomad, While we were staying in Delft, we took the train to Rotterdam, tram to the port, then the water taxi to Kinderdijk. We were really glad we did, but it's a bit time consuming to get there, and the waterbus is only about once an hour, so you have to really time coordinate your trip. We truly enjoyed our afternoon there, but if you are going to Delft to relax prior to a long flight back home, it may be more involved than you want for your days in Delft. Not trying to dissuade you, because we certainly enjoyed it, but wanted to share our experience.

"but man oh man were we unimpressed with the "themed" rooms."

@Tom R - Isn't that the truth! I was so glad a friend warned me ahead of time! My room was a South American (I think) theme complete with a snake painted on the ceiling over the round bed with an orange fuzzy spread AND a mural of aboriginal boys on the wall in the bathroom so they stared at you while you were in the shower! Yikes.

I loved Delft. It's the perfect wandering around and taking it easy kind of place. I stayed at Hotel Grand Canal. https://www.grandcanaldelft.nl/en

I don’t understand your comment that you basically would not stay in Leiden” because it’s too close to Schipol?”
We spent a beautiful week there and it was a wonderful base for visiting the neighboring towns.It is one of our favorite places to visit in Europe.
To answer your question, stay in Delft.

We spent 5 nights in Leiden earlier this month and really enjoyed it. It was our first trip to the Netherlands so for us it was convenient for Amsterdam, The Hague and Kinderijk. We did not get to Delft. Kinderijk was a recommendation from this group and we had a great day- it was a bit longer than expected to get there but we rented bikes and spent about 4.5 hours cycling in the area. It’s a bit of a walk out to the windmills if mobility is an issue but we also saw many people enjoying the view from the outdoor cafe area.