Hardly any other country in Europe is so strongly connected to the sea as the Netherlands. With a coastline of 2.000 kilometers, almost half of the country lies below sea level. Without protection, it would be completely flooded by the North Sea. But the Dutch are in their element when just mentioning the seaside. Up until a hundred years ago, they used to pump the water from the lowlands back to the canals behind the dykes. Later they built modern flood barriers, huge dams and even laboriously wrested large areas from the unrelenting sea. “Niew Land” has been created, where wild horses fight and foxes have their den.
The Netherlands are bursting with an amazing nature: seals and spoonbills, red and fallow deer, marsh harriers, beavers and even otters. And all of this is in one of the most densely populated countries in Europe.
