14th May 2016
Flevoland Polder to Strandhorst

Brrrr. Chilly and drizzly again. 10C outside this morning. Oh well, it´s almost time to head home although I hear the weather there is not a lot better.

We only had an uneventful 12km to do today. We had a longish wait at the Lovenik lock out of the polder - sometimes it´s hard to know if they realise one is there at these unmanned locks. There is a button you press for service, but no indication if it is working or not. You just sit patiently (or impatiently, as the case may be) and wait for the red light to turn red/green at which point you jump around getting ready to go in the lock when the door eventually opens. And the wait could be anything from 30 seconds to 20 minutes, although the latter is rare. There are cctv cameras monitoring the locks and their approaches, and presumably humans somewhere watching them..... or so you hope.

Last lock. The shorts have been replaced with longs and we have had to dig the rain jackets out again. Pity.

Anyhow, we are now back at home port, fuel tanks filled, bilges pumped and the first load of laundry spinning. Skip is taking the fresh-water pump apart as it has been making funny noises the last couple of days. There is a feest up the meer a little ways at Strandnulde, with bbqs, eel smokeries, beer etc but we would have to cycle and it´s too chilly with the odd shower so we´ll give it a miss. According to Dick, this is usually one of the busiest weekends of the year (it is another long weekend), but the weather has put most people off as there is hardly anyone around.


WARNING: This next bit could get boring.


Sooooo .... Skip has suggested I tell you what the polder is I have been mentioning the last couple of days. If you already know, or don´t wanna know, then I suggest you run away now.

OK - prior to 1939 there was a huge estuary/inland sea in the North Sea called the Zuiderzee. Although referred to as an inland sea, it was actually open to the north sea, protected only by a row of outer islands. 

The whole area was prone to flooding and boy could it flood. After a devastating one in 1919, it was decided to finally do something about it and a 32km dike called the Afsuitduijk was completed in 1932. This turned the Zuiderzee into a huge lake, called the Ijsselmeer, which eventually turned into fresh water as it is fed by a number of rivers, in particular the Rhine.

Huge parts of the lake were then reclaimed and the resulting land is called a polder. The first polder, called the Noordoostpolder was completed in 1959 and joined a couple of islands in the Ijsselmeer to the mainland. Further south a 1,419 sq.km rectangular island was created and completed in 1968 - the Flevoland Polder. 

Another dijk was then built splitting the Ijsselmeer into two parts. The southern part, in which we have been bouncing the last couple of weeks, is called the Markermeer. The plan had been to eventually reclaim all the land which is now the Markermeer, but they ran out of money and by the time funds were available again, ecologists has put a stop to it. It was also realised what a great resource it was for wildlife, recreation and as a reservoir in times of drought for which purpose it was used as recently as 2009.

The Flevoland Polder is criss-crossed with drainage canals,  a couple of which are navigable by large vessels (including little us). There are 5 entrances from the meers into the Polder through locks which vary in size but which all have a 5m drop as the Polder is 5m lower than the surrounding lakes.

Flevoland canal.

The Flevoland polder has a dividing dijk (looked about 6m high, but that´s just a guess) separating the north half from the south. Should one polder flood, it can be cut off from the other. These huge gates would be closed to cut off the canal.

The southern part of the Polder is particularly pretty to cruise through as there are lots of woods and national parks and unless one particularly wants to visit the towns on the mainland coast, (been there, done that) it is a much smoother ride. The polder is totally flat so there is only the lock in and the lock out and the bridges are all high enough to pass through without needing lifting.

So, there, now you know what a polder is.