Where are you thinking of going on holiday? If it's Amsterdam then there's good news for you. Eurostar has just released £39 tickets to get either from or to the Dutch capital.
The city – famously known, by a certain type of tourist at any rate, for its red light district and relaxed laws on cannabis smoking – is one of a number of European hotspots that you can travel to on the cheap thanks to Eurostar's latest raft of deals.
If Amsterdam doesn't take your fancy, you can also take your pick of Brussels, Paris, Lille or Rotterdam to travel to from London St. Pancras International at a bargain price.
Advert
Even better, the time frame on this offer is pretty long and stretches right through summer – you can travel to these cities anytime between June 14 and September 11.
There's no need to worry about keeping it tight on the amount of clothes you take away or souvenirs you might want to bring back either, as the deal includes generous luggage allowance per person of two pieces of luggage (up to 85 cm long) and one item of hand luggage with no weight limit.
Should you wish to mix it up after purchasing, meanwhile, customers can exchange tickets in Standard and Standard Premier as many times as they want without paying an exchange fee, so long as tickets are exchanged seven days or more before the departure date of their individual journey. As ever, make sure you read the terms and conditions before booking.
Tourists might be keen to flock to Amsterdam, but locals have become increasingly concerned at the antics of some hedonist-seekers from abroad in recent times.
As the city opened up from a pandemic lockdown last summer, tour guide Louke Spigt said to The Independent that Brits coming over to booze and party were starting to become a problem.
They said: "The problems are the uncontrollable groups of drinking Brits, the low-budget tourists who throw all their waste on the streets
"We want other (kinds of) tourists."
Meanwhile Ko Koens, professor of new urban tourism at Inholland University of Applied Sciences, said: "Amsterdam is in a lucky position where it could really use the pandemic to try some new things."
"This is the time to experiment," he added.
The deputy mayor of the city, Victor Everhardt, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation by email: "If tourists only want to smoke weed, drink too much alcohol and visit the Red Light District, please stay home.
"We have not been able to steal great ideas from other cities – they are now looking at us on how we are dealing with tourism."
So the message is clear: enjoy your cheap trip to Amsterdam but please behave responsibly, or else the freedom of the city that's so loved by all could soon change.
Topics: Travel
Simon Catling