March 5- Today we had our first excursion for our STNL class. For our field trip we went and looked at Terps, dikes, and mud flats. For those of you who don’t know, Terps are essentially just elevated places of land. We began our journey to Friesland by traveling across the Afsluitdijk. The Afsluitdijk is a massive dike that separates the Ijsselmeer from the North Sea.
This dike stretches for 30 kilometers with water on both sides. We also stopped and walked around. This was actually the same place that my family and I stopped when we were in the Netherlands four years ago. Went continued on to Friesland, the providence where my ancestors are from. The land is mainly farming land with miles upon miles of green fields, which was a nice change from the classic old city brick look of Amsterdam where there is absolutely no green.
This part of the journey was my favorite because it offered a really nice and relaxing car ride through a seemingly different country from what I am used to.
We also stopped at a number of other dikes and looked around. Our first major stop was in Dokkum. It is a small town in Friesland where we learned a little about the history of Dokkum and also toured the church which is located on the highest Terp in the country.
As we continued, we saw the mud flats in Friesland located on the North Sea.
During low tide, people can walk on the mud and with the help of a tour guide, can actually walk “on water” to one of the islands in Northern Holland. This was the last stop on our trip. This was the first really leaving the urban settings of Amsterdam or Haarlem which was a very nice change in pace. The rural farming country offered a calming feeling that I have not felt in several months and it was nice to feel once again.
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