Aug 26 (Tuesday) – Ameland, An Island

We had a date with a ferry this morning.  We drove from Leewarden to the coast and caught a ferry to Ameland, a barrier island along the coast of The Netherlands.  Part of the island is natural (sand dunes, and shrublands) and much of it is reclaimed land. 

The ferry ride was about half an hour.  The ferry was large with a huge area for eating, visiting and playing games.

Once on the island we drove to the nature museum where we met John, our local guide for our island tour.  The tour was in an electric golf cart…so we got to cover a lot of territory.  A very colorful display of buoys in someone's yard.

We drove through a lot of fields…

many with drainage ditches. 

We saw lots of pastures with cows...

and some old Dutch windmills.

We ended up at a dike that overlooked the Wadden Sea.  We could see many kite surfers in the distance.  It is very windy here. 

The tide was in so it looked pretty much like any other body of water.  However, it is only about a meter and a half deep so when the tide is out you can walk all over the place in the mud. 

There were some dredging boats in the distance.  Apparently, they work year-round keeping the channel open through the Wadden Sea.

Along the drives we saw some Friesian horses.  This horse is native to the area and is a big beautiful all black horse with flowing main and tail and feathering (fringy hair) on the legs.  They are beautiful and majestic.

Next stop was in the park at the north end of the island.  This is the all-natural part of the island with rolling shrublands and sand dunes.  

And there was a long beach with many sand dunes.  We stopped at one of the dunes to take a look at the long, lovely beach and the North Sea beyond.  The sand was some of the softest and finest we had ever seen and felt.

We saw many bicycles with three and four seats.  The dad had the back seat and the kids sat on the smaller/shorter front seats.  Very ingenious way to move around a bunch of kids.

For such a small island there was a great variety of topography.  We drove through a very wooded area...

At the end of the tour we stopped in the nature museum to go to the top of the tower for views of the island.

We then drove to the other end of the island and had lunch in Hollum, one of the three small communities on the island.

A Nearby Shop

We also made a short stop for pictures of the lighthouse.

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More Ameland
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Then it was off to the ferry for the ride back across the Wadden Sea (some statues on a dike not far from the ferry terminal)…

and then back to Leewarden.  We opted to walk down the street to check out another restaurant.  Turned out it was a Turkish restaurant, so we decided to have dinner there.  The food was good.  Then back to the hotel to pack.