Through historic wierde villages

Discover the Groningen of the wierde villages, the canals and the wide fields and grasslands. You make a short route, but you will need your time to take a good look at the many beautiful buildings.

Churches on the wierden
Cycling through the wierde villages you will see many characteristic buildings, such as old schools and presbyteries. One of the first brick churches in Groningen stands on the wierde van Oosterwijtwerd. You can also admire a beautiful thirteenth-century church in Godlinze. Finds from Roman times and the early Middle Ages have been made in the wierde van Arwerd. Now there are four farms.

Mammoth
In Zeerijp you will pass windmill De Leeuw, a corn and hulling mill that was built here in 1865. Also beautiful to see: the Jacobuskerk, which originated in the middle of the fourteenth century. In 1821, the bone of a femur of (probably) a mammoth was found in Zeerijp. In 1906 the bone was lost in a fire in a museum.

Borg Ekenstein
Groningen once had more than 200 guarantors. Many of them have disappeared through debt. The owners were forced to sell their property, after which the deposit was broken. The deposit Ekensteijn is one of the seventeen preserved deposits. It was built in 1648 by order of the doctor and later mayor of Groningen Johan Eeck. In 1772 the deposit was expanded and provided with a moat. In the nineteenth century, a park in English landscape style was laid out by garden and landscape architect Lucas Pieters Roodbaard. Towards the end of this century, the Borg received a neo-Gothic makeover. Stained glass windows from various churches in Groningen were installed in the library, for example. In addition to Ekenstein, you can also admire an old country house founded by the Eeck family: Rusthoven, which dates from 1686.