Round Dwingelderveld and Beilen

From here you cycle to the Mantingerveld, where you cycle through the heath along drifting sand hills overgrown with juniper berries. Dwingelderveld National Park, a little further on, is the largest wet heath area in Western Europe. Wet lows and high sandy ridges alternate. You will find heather, forest, juniper groves, shifting sand and more than forty fens. Some of these fens were created during the Ice Age, others are the result of peat excavations. In the spring you see white peat fluff, in the summer the heath turns purple. In Beilen, the es still forms the center of the village. You can admire the fifteenth-century Stephen's Church. Just outside the village you pass the Molen van Makkum, a beautiful flour mill from 1906.