Heeg, Balk and Koudum

The Frisian region of Gaasterland is a completely different type of area than you would expect to find in the Frisian province: instead of a flat polder and meadow landscape, this nature reserve has richly rolling forests. The relief created by the rising and sloping landscape formed a natural protective wall against the water of the Zuiderzee, and now still against the water of the IJsselmeer. At the highest point in Gaasterland there is an air watchtower that offers a beautiful view of land and sea.

Workum is the youngest of the Frisian Eleven Cities and received city rights in 1399. Since the fifteenth century, Workum focused on shipbuilding, but when many polders were constructed in the seventeenth century, mill construction also became an important pillar. The nostalgia of that time is still palpable, because Workum is a protected cityscape. With many attractions, the relatively unknown town is a hidden treasure, waiting to be discovered.

In the village of Woudsend there is a beautiful octagonal tower mill on a white brick base: windmill't Lam. The mill is still used as a grist and husking mill and although the exact year of construction is unknown, it is suspected that't Lam was built before 1698. Since 200, the miller's house, which is next to the mill, has housed a mill shop and an information center about the mill.

In the village of Indijk you will see a beautiful bell tower. The colossus stands on a kind of mound in a meadow, near a small cemetery. In 1720 there was already a bell chair at a small church that has since been destroyed, and it was close to disappearing, because in 1949 a heavy storm destroyed the chair. The fourteenth-century bell was stored, but brought out again in 1978 when the current bell chair was installed.

Just before you return to the starting point of the tour, you will see the Nylânner mill. This octagonal upper porter was probably built in 1784 as a polder mill. The ground sailer drains 440 hectares of polder and was not the first mill at this location. In 1624, the year in which the polder was diked, a mill with a water wheel was already installed. That mill later received an auger that was too small, after which the current mill, including a larger auger, was installed. The mill operated on wind power until 1950, after which a diesel engine was installed in the mill to provide the drive.