Lage Vuursche

Lage Vuursche is a hamlet of a few hundred people in the woods on the Utrechtse Heuvelrug, and it has one industry: pancakes. Since the nineteenth century the village has been the destination for a Sunday walk or drive out of the surrounding towns, and the result is a single street with an unusual density of pancake houses, which is a specific Dutch institution - the pannenkoekenhuis, an establishment serving nothing but large thin pancakes with sweet and savoury toppings, aimed squarely at families after a walk in the woods. Kasteel Drakensteyn stands in the forest beside it, a small seventeenth-century octagonal house bought by Princess Beatrix in 1959, where she lived before her reign and to which she returned after abdicating in 2013. It is a private residence and not open. The forest around is well walked and cycled.

What you actually see

• A street of pancake houses - the Dutch pannenkoekenhuis institution in concentration.
• A Sunday walking destination - the village's whole function since the nineteenth century.
• Kasteel Drakensteyn - the octagonal house where Princess Beatrix lives, not open.
• Heuvelrug forest - the woods around, walked and cycled from here.

When to go

April to October. Half a day.

Honest expectations

The castle is a private home and cannot be visited or approached. Pancake houses are packed on Sundays and in good weather - expect a wait. There is nothing else in the village.

Nearby

Baarn and Paleis Soestdijk are north; Soesterduinen is east.