Netherlands

Tags: Leeuwarden, Netherlands, sailing

Date: September 3, 2016

We spent some days on the canals and the IJselmeer in the Netherlands while we had westerly winds. We figured that it would be nicer in the canals than in the North Sea. The IJselmeer is a big area that used to be part of the North Sea but is now surrounded by dikes and has turned into a large fresh water lake.

Typical old Dutch barges:

Some areas are very pretty:

Here we are in Leeuwarden:

In Leeuwarden like many other Dutch towns, you just tie up to the side of the canal in the park in the center of town.

The canals have lots of work boats moving things around. Many are heavily loaded:

Nice old sailing ship:

The northern part of the country is quite rural:

They were building a new bridge in one town:

The canals need dredging sometimes:

We passed Amsterdam:

We went all the way to IJmuiden which is a coastal town west of Amsterdam.