Rooms and doors of Oosterpark
The streets around the park were built at the same time as the park itself, and the houses facing it are generous: tall brick buildings with bay windows and apartments that stretch the full depth of the block. Behind them, the side streets hold smaller flats, many rented to visitors, reached by steep shared stairs. Several hotels occupy converted offices near the Wibautstraat and the Mauritskade, with lifts, larger rooms and staff at the desk through the night. The park closes to traffic but not to people, and evening joggers run its paths until late. Linnaeusstraat, on the eastern side, has trams into the centre and a string of cafés and bakeries. By eleven on a weekday evening the neighbourhood is residential and quiet, which suits a visitor who prefers not to cross a lobby full of other guests on the way to the lifts. In winter the park is dark by five, and the streets along its edge are lit but nearly empty after nine, so the walk from the tram stop to your door takes her past closed shutters and the occasional cyclist, and nothing else.
