Om Espel by Emmeloord

Cycling near the IJsselmeer near Emmeloord means that you are cycling in a place that was reclaimed for land reclamation. This guarantees a voyage of discovery through bulb fields and along the carcasses of decayed ships. The shipwrecks are still clearly visible on the route and form a bizarre contrast to the vibrancy and color splendor that you see on the bulb fields. The route starts at Attent SidB Van Slooten in Tollebeek. Here you can easily park your car (free) and start the tour. If you want to buy something nice for the road, the supermarket is very practically at the starting point of the route. Here you can buy a healthy piece of fruit for the necessary vitamin boost on the go or buy something to drink to quench your thirst. The first fargoing ship on the route arrives after about six kilometers. The ship of the galliot type was built in 1655 at a shipyard in Enkhuizen. The VOC used the ship from 1655 to 1663. Together with the Waekende Boey, the vessel went from Batavia to the Australian west coast in 1658 to help survivors of the Vergulde Draeck, which had died two years earlier. In 1663 this ship was wrecked in the galliot on the island of Damman. The far-reaching ships that you see further along the route once sailed through the Zuiderzee, just like the previous one. This sea is an indispensable water for the former transport of goods and people. Ships sank in one of countless storms and ended up at the bottom of the sea, where they became covered with sand, clay and mud. When the polder was drained to create Flevoland, a total of 435 shipwrecks literally surfaced. This makes Flevoland one of the largest exposed ship graveyards in the world. One bulb field after another comes into view when you continue cycling. In the Middle Ages, the village of Creil was a small hamlet on the edge of the Zuiderzee. The first houses were built here in 1953. Creil is the center of the agricultural sector in the municipality of Noordoostpolder and of flower bulb culture. You will find many flower bulb growers in this area. Every year in the spring, a well-known festival is organized in the polder: the Creiler Flora. In the spring (especially around the end of April) walking or cycling here is very special and the bulb fields are a true feast for the eyes. The last characteristic element in Flevoland are the windmills. The absolute highlight is the collection of windmills north of Urk. More than a hundred agricultural entrepreneurs from the Noordoostpolder, together with energy company Essent, are building the largest wind farm in the Netherlands on the outskirts of Urk, on and in the water. The park has no less than 86 wind turbines and generates approximately 1.4 billion kWh of sustainable electricity every year; enough to meet the needs of 400,000 households. With this extensive wind farm, the Noordoostpolder has become one of the front runners in Europe in modern wind energy.