The Mill Network at Kinderdijk-Elshout was the Dutch World Heritage Site I was most excited to visit when I traveled to the Netherlands in the summer of 2014. When I was growing up, I had associated windmills with the Netherlands, but I hadn't realized their role in water management until I arrived at Kinderdijk. A theater at the visitor center showed a movie explaining how the mills worked to pump water out of the lower land of the polder so it could be drained into rivers -- I'm rather in awe at the engineering ingenuity the Dutch employed here and throughout the country! Kinderdijk is an outdoor museum of 19 windmills picturesquely situated along canals in a polder just a short distance east of Rotterdam. I had intended to rent a bicycle in Rotterdam to take with me to Kinderdijk, but there were no bikes available at rental sites. Despite the setback, I enjoyed a relaxing walk on the paths to the windmills, stopping to take in the views of the turning sails reflected in the canals. Two of the windmills were open for visitors on the Saturday of my visit, allowing visitors the opportunity to see the gears and living areas inside the mills. This complex is a fine and memorable piece of Dutch heritage on the World Heritage Site list.

Logistics: Kinderdijk can be reached by private transportation or, on weekends between May and September, by boat from Rotterdam (requiring a boat change at Ridderkirk for Kinderdijk).