Harlingen

Harlingen is the only Frisian town with a working connection to open salt water - the rest lost theirs when the Zuiderzee was closed - and the ferries to Terschelling and Vlieland leave from here, along with a commercial port and a fishing fleet. The old town has about five hundred listed buildings along two harbours and a canal, from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries when Harlingen was a whaling and Baltic trading port, with warehouses, merchant houses and a sea dyke you can walk along the top of. The Hannemahuis museum covers the town and the tile industry - Harlingen made tin-glazed tiles on a large scale and one factory still does by hand. The harbour lighthouse of 1922 was converted into a one-room hotel with a single bed at the top and a glass floor, which books out a long way ahead.

What you actually see

• Working salt water - the only Frisian town still on the open sea, with the island ferries.
• About five hundred listed buildings - the whaling and Baltic trading port fabric.
• Hand-made tiles - the Harlingen tin-glaze tradition, one workshop still working.
• A lighthouse hotel - the 1922 harbour light converted into a single room.

When to go

April to October. A day.

Honest expectations

The lighthouse hotel is one room and books months ahead. Ferry days fill the town and the parking. The museum closes on Mondays. It is a working port, so parts are industrial.

Nearby

Terschelling and Vlieland are by ferry; Makkum is south.