Soest (Netherlands)

Soest is a medium sized city in the Dutch province of Utrecht. It's known as a major base for the Dutch army, which uses large parts of forests and heathlands of the surrounding Soesterduinen and Soesterberg as training grounds. For visitors, those same natural surroundings make for good hiking and biking opportunities, and there's an interesting new army museum to visit.

By train
Soest has 3 NS railway stations: Soest, Soestdijk and Soest zuid. Soestduinen has been closed for quite some time now. All three stations are serviced every 30 minutes by the all-station-service between Utrecht and Baarn. Soest-Utrecht takes less than 20 minutes, Soest-Amsterdam takes about 50 minutes.

By Bus
Connexion services Soest, most buses drive every 30 minutes, but hardly any at night. Probably because of the lack of nightlife.

By Car
Soest is almost in the middle of the country, so it is easily reached from whichever direction you're coming. All parking is free, but can be a bit of a hassle around the shopping areas.

Get around
Walking or using a bike is the easiest way to travel in Soest. Distances are short, and everything is close to wherever you are.

See
The old town "Oud Soest" is a quaint corner. The town may not hold as many historic monuments as some other Dutch cities, but there surely are a few interesting sights.

The Soesterduinen are ideal for hiking, forests are interspersed with dunes - which you might not expect 50 miles from the sea.