South Holland, the Netherlands.

When someone mentions Holland or The Netherlands, two things that many people imagine are windmills and tulips (and maybe wooden shoes.) Since we visited Rotterdam in October, tulips were not in bloom, so we chose to see the windmills at Kinderdijk.

We arrived in Amsterdam after leaving South Africa for a two-day stay. The eleven-hour flight from Johannesburg put us at Shiopol Airport the following morning. We opted to do a little exploring before checking into our hotel, and after dinner at the hotel restaurant, we caught up on our sleep.

We scheduled a private tour with Viator for the next day, and bright and early, our tour guide arrived on time. Over the next few weeks, I will feature photos of the stops we made on our tour. Kinderdijk was our last major stop.

Kinderdijk, a UNESCO World Heritage Site in the Netherlands, is renowned for its 19 historic windmills that once formed a vital part of the Dutch water management system. These iconic windmills, built in the 18th century, were designed to pump excess water from the low-lying polder (land reclaimed from the sea), protecting the land from flooding.

A bridge crosses the canal near the visitor center. Paths on either side of the canal invite people to visit each windmill site. One windmill has a museum where visitors can tour its interior workings. The building in the background on the left is the Wisboom Pumping Station.

As the mostly cloudy skies started to threaten rain, we opted to stay close to the visitor center to avoid being caught in a shower.

For those who don’t wish to walk the trails, a tour boat provides views of the windmills from the canal. We opted not to take the tour boat and walked a short distance along the paths to explore the exhibits nearest the visitor center.

Placards along the paths describe the purposes of the structures and give a glimpse of the lives of the people who tended the mills.

The placards’ photos and descriptions are humorous and reflect life in the Netherlands. As a man of a certain age (ok, elderly), I never knew what a bedstead was, even though my mother used the term often. Truthfully, from the definition on this placard, I’d never seen a bedstead, nor did my mother, as far as I know.

Beatrice’s Cradle is a sculpture commemorating the Saint-Elizabeth Flood, a ferocious storm that occurred 600 years ago. After the storm, when the survivors dared to go outside again, they saw a cradle floating along the dike, from which the cry of a child could be heard. The bobbing crib was balanced by a cat, which jumped back and forth to keep the basket from sinking and thus kept the baby alive. Getting the 400-pound bronze statue to float and rock, just like the cat did, required a lot of thought and expertise. More details regarding the sculpture are on the Kinderdijk website here.

Visitors can see the interiors of the two pumping stations that replace the need for the windmills. The secondary pumping station has a small theater inside that tells the story of the systems. While modern electric pumping stations are the primary means of water management today, several historic windmills are kept in working order. They are occasionally used to demonstrate their functionality and maintain this site’s cultural heritage.

As we concluded our tour, it started to sprinkle, so we stopped at the visitor center before heading to the parking lot and continuing our tour. We drove by some historic Rotterdam buildings and were dropped off at our hotel. I’ve posted these images in 2K HD on my Flickr site here.

John Steiner