Windmills at Kinderdijk

Interesting facts

Most of the mills are still lived in: the residents are bound to maintain them and set the sails turning on a set number of days each year.

The sails of the Overwaard mills span up to about 29.5 metres, slightly more than those of the brick Nederwaard mills at around 28 metres.

Each mill could raise water only about 1.4 metres, which is why the polder had to be drained in stages through raised storage basins.

The Overwaard mills lift water with scoop wheels about 6.7 metres across, turned by the sails through gearing inside the mill body.

The Blokweer mill, whose origins go back to the early fifteenth century, was badly damaged by fire in 1997 and was turning again by 2001.

There were once twenty mills here: the Oude Molen of the Nieuw-Lekkerland polder was demolished in 1957.

Eleven of the mills underwent a major restoration from 2008, funded with about 3.5 million euros from the national government, the province and the water board.

Water trouble in the Alblasserwaard goes back to the thirteenth century, when the first large drainage canals, called weteringen, were dug across the peat.

By 2019 the site was drawing up to about 600,000 visitors a year, to a hamlet whose mills were built purely as machinery.

Kinderdijk appears as a playable location in the 2005 PlayStation 2 game Sly 3: Honor Among Thieves.

Why it is worth it

Few places show so plainly how the Dutch made their own ground. At Kinderdijk, where the Lek and the Noord meet on the edge of the Alblasserwaard, nineteen windmills stand in long lines beside the drainage channels, the largest surviving group of old mills anywhere in the Netherlands. They were not built for picturesque effect: each one was a pump, and together they kept a low-lying polder from turning back into marsh. UNESCO added the whole mill network to its World Heritage List in 1997.

Look closely and the rows are not identical. The eight mills of the Nederwaard, raised in 1738, are round and built of brick; the eight of the Overwaard, from 1740, are octagonal and clad in reed thatch. Two more thatched octagons belong to the Nieuw-Lekkerland polder, and the small Blokweer mill is a hollow post mill of a different type altogether. A single windmill could lift water only a limited height, so the system worked in steps: mills pumped from the polder ditches into higher storage basins, and from there the water was let out to the river. Some of the mills are still kept in working order, and a couple, including Nederwaard mill no. 5 and the Blokweer mill, are open as museum mills.

The landscape also records what replaced the wind. Two steam pumping stations went up in 1868; one of them, the Wisboom, survives and now runs with electric power, while the J.U. Smit station of 1972 and the De Overwaard station of 1995 took over the heavy work, the latter with large Archimedean screws that can be seen turning from outside. Even the name has a story attached: local tradition holds that after the great flood of 1421 a wooden cradle drifted ashore here with a baby asleep inside, kept upright by a cat jumping from side to side — the "child's dike" of Kinderdijk.

The best way to take it in is slowly, along the towpaths between the channels, when the sails are turning and the reflections double every mill in the still water.

Getting there

Kinderdijk lies about 3 km from the centre of Alblasserdam and roughly 15 km east of Rotterdam. The nearest airport is Rotterdam The Hague Airport (RTM), about 16 km away. A water shuttle runs from Rotterdam in around half an hour and bicycles can be taken on board; buses and water shuttles also link the site with Dordrecht. Cycle paths cross the surrounding polder. In the main season car parking is at a transferium in Alblasserdam with a shuttle bus to the entrance; in winter cars can park at the site itself.

From the encyclopaedia

The Kinderdijk windmills are a group of 19 monumental windmills in the Alblasserwaard polder, in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. Most of the mills are part of the village of Kinderdijk in the municipality of Molenlanden, and one mill, De Blokker, is part of the municipality of Alblasserdam. Built in 1738 and 1740, to keep water out of the polder, it is the largest concentration of old windmills in the Netherlands and one of the best-known Dutch tourist sites. The mills are listed as national monuments and the entire area is a protected village view since 1993. They have been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1997, and as such are officially named as the Mill Network at Kinderdijk-Elshout.

Wikipedia · CC BY-SA 4.0

Windmills at Kinderdijk

Interesting facts

Why it is worth it

Getting there

Plan your visit

On these lists

From the encyclopaedia