A high-and-dry island: the Dutch province Flevoland

By Bernd F Meier Jul 27, 2010, 14:38 GMT

Leylystad, the Netherlands - Cor Wisse lets his bicycle coast downhill - a distance of just a few metres.

'And now we have reached the bottom of what used to be the Zuidersee,' the museum guide from Schokland explains to visitors, who can't hide their wonder that they are standing on what used to be the bottom of a sea. All they see now is a wide expanse of green land stretching before them.

Schokland was yesterday. Today, it's Flevoland. The former island of Schokland has, since 1942, been literally sitting high and dry. Ten years earlier, the last gap of a 30-kilometre-long dike in the northern part of The Netherlands was completed, starting a gradual process: what was once the Zuiderzee inlet of the North Sea evolved into the freshwater lake Ijsselmeer.

In the decades to follow, up till 1968, there evolved through further dike construction three 'polders' or landfill areas, Noordoost-, Ost- and Suedflevoland. With the help of these the Dutch wrested huge new land areas from the Ijsselmeer, to create The Netherlands' 12th province, Flevoland.

'We are very young - but also very old,' Cor Wisse explains while starting off with his guests on a bicycling tour of Schokland. The history of the island measuring just 5 kilometres long and one-half kilometre wide goes back to 3,600 BC. 'This was determined after the discovery of footprints by archaeologists.'

For many generations, the up to 700 residents of the three small villages on Schokland were exposed to the dangerous elements - winds, storms and threatening tides.

Today, Schokland is a museum island and became the first Dutch monument listed as a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage site. The tiny village of Middlebuurt, with its small church and the former harbour of Ooud-Emmeloord were carefully reconstructed.

Not nearly as old as Schokland, but still just as historically significant for Flevoland is the former fishing island of Urk off the Ijsselmeer shore. The tiny town was first connected with the mainland in 1941.

This changed a lot of things for the Urk residents who like to preserve their centuries-old traditions. A visitor can hear many stories about the life of the fishermen in the 'Ginkiestocht' or narrow alleys of the old village.

'Sometimes we feel like we ourselves are in a museum,' says Jaap Bakker during a stroll past the small fishermen's cottages with their gables painted a dark green.

On the elevation of Wijk the houses are clustered close together. Each square metre of precious soil is put to use. One can search in vain for a large garden, as the Urkians like to decorate their houses with an abundance of flowers. Particularly impressive are the views from atop the 18-metre-high light tower. In the summer, visitors can climb up a narrow winding stairway to the light beacon and the tiny lookout platform.

For friends of modern architecture, a side excursion to Almere is an absolute must: the city centre gleams with buildings of the important architects of our times, including David Chipperfield, Rene van Zuuk, Christian de Portzamparc and Rem Koolhaas. Architectural tours inform visitors about the central area of this growing city of 200,000 residents.

The first people arrived in Almere just 34 years ago. In 1976, some 500 people settled onto the newly-recovered land which not long before had been the bottom of a sea.