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 Hello. My name if Ruffles, and I am one of the Traveling Rats - even though I don't care to travel myself! But I couldn't pass up this chance to show you a little bit of my home, the Netherlands. Amelia stopped by here last year briefly before jetting off to yet another international location. She had a good time and so will you if you come to my country for a visit. In May 2005, my companion and I went to Creil in the Noordoostpolder (North East Polder) to see the tulips. This polder was made by the Dutch in 1942 by pumping up sand and draining away the water. This way we gained more land! It was a lovely day, unexpectedly warm for the time of year: 25º C! |
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| We went on a bicycle tour starting at a tulip information center. Beside a large red tulip field there was a long row with tiny tulip “fields” (flowerbeds) so that one would get to learn all kinds of tulips. I wanted to be in all the pics, but sometimes I had to hold the camera. I asked the guide about the tulips. He told me that each year in October/November they put the bulbs into the soil. In April and May the bulbs grow out to be tulips. Then they cut off only the tulip heads (flower) so that the bulbs get to grow strong and large and small bulbs will grow attached to the original bulb. After that they wait till the stem and leaves have died and after that they take the bulbs out of the fields. At first this was done manually, but nowadays by machine, the bulbs get peeled by taking the new, small attached bulbs off the original bulb. The original bulbs are for sale to the public and the new small bulbs are put back in the bulb fields again in fall that same year so the same cycle starts again. On the bike tour and I saw many beautifully colored tulip fields! I just couldn’t get enough! Following are some pictures of me among the tulips, and the fields. Aren't they beautiful? I wish the tulips bloomed all the time. | |||||||||
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After the bicycle tour we drove to
Urk, a
fisherman's village, which used to be at the seaside until the large dike
was built in the North of the
Netherlands.
Fishing is still their main income. It is a beautifully picturesque
village; however, because of their strong Protestant religion, all the shops
and restaurants are closed on Sundays. Still, I wanted to have an ice cream
and luckily enough there was one ice cream parlor open for those of us with
Sunday sweet tooths.
After we saw Urk we drove on to
Schokland.
The island
of Schokland has been inhabited
since the Middle Ages by fishermen. Through the
centuries the life of the inhabitants was one of terrible hardship. Not only
did they suffer poverty and floods but their island took a constant
battering from the sea and slowly became
smaller and smaller.
Flooding caused a great deal of damage to
the humble dwellings in spite of the great effort put in the building of
dikes for protection. In 1859 a decision was taken to clear the island
because the government could no longer guarantee the safety of the
islanders. The 700 Schokkers were given 4 months to demolish their property
and move to the mainland. They found shelter in villages around where many
picked up their old ways of life and became fishermen once more.
Since reclaiming the Noordoostpolder in 1942, Schokland has been sinking
little by little; experts have measured a drop of 1.8 meters since that
time! This is because the island’s subsoil is peat, an insubstantial soil
type containing a lot of water. During the reclamation, when the water was
being pumped out of the Noordoostpolder, the water was also drawn out of
this peat and the island started to sink. The surrounding area is not
effected by this phenomenon because the subsoil there is clay.
Schokland is so special that it was the first monument in the Netherlands
to be included on the Unesco World Heritage List.
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