Amsterdam - Windmills

Last Updated: December 13, 1999

Sorry, there aren't very many windmills in Amsterdam. I found three in the city, and many more while cycling. The easiest one to get to is De Grooyer a bit east of the central city. You should be able to see it down the canal in front of the Maritime museum. It's now owned by a brewing company, and supposedly they run the windmill the first Saturday of every month. And I saw several on my bike rides outside the city. Here is a list; the ones above the line are in Amsterdam, the ones below are outside of Amsterdam.

Amsterdam Mills

de Grooyer's. Not too far from the Maritime Museum. Easy to get to from the Rijksmuseum: just take a 7 or 10 tram.
Haarlemmerweg, west of the Jordaan, near a cemetery.
Haarlemmerweg, further west.
On the south edge of Amstel Park.
de Otter On the Kostverlorenvaart, just north of 2e Hugo de Grootstraat
On the Hoekenesgracht at Herman Bonpad.
Krijtmolen. North of the Het Ij, on the Noordhollandsch Kanaal, just south of Jan Thomeepad.

Mills outside of Amsterdam

Zaanse-Schans. The Netherlands moved a lot of windmills and other buildings here to recreate a small village. Some of the windmills are still working. A major tourist spot, but worth a visit if you want to see windmills near Amsterdam. Take a tour bus, or catch a train. It's close to Amsterdam.
Molen Van Sloten. In Sloten, just outside of Amsterdam. The #2 tram takes you most of the way there (the 68 bus takes you the rest of the way if you don't want to walk). At the corner of Akersluis and Langom. The only one of the mills I found that you could go in and get a tour of. It's also an operating mill, pumping water out of Sloten and Amsterdam into the Ringvaart, to be dumped into the North Sea at low tide. While they let the blades run when open, they only engage the Archimedes screw when the water level is high enough. Alas, the water level wasn't high enough when I visited.
You can also see the mill from the airplane. I took a picture (the third time I saw it from the air), but only had an 80mm lens. It's much easier to spot from the plane than it is in this picture.
On the Amstel River, 1km north of Oudekerk
Delpine (1 km east of Abcoude)
1km south of Niegtevechtl
Near Hornpolder
Just north of Vreeland
De Slokop. North-East of Harlem, north of Penningsveer.
De Veer. Just outside Harlem, across from Penningsveer. This one is in ruins. It appears to have burned; all that is left are the blackened timbers of the frame.
Northern Harlem. This one is in a park next to a lake. The windmill is smaller and a bit different from most of the others I'd seen.
Between Oostzaan and Landsmeer, not too far from Zaanse-Schans.
Windmolen de Onrust. Halfway between Muiden and Naarden, just south of the freeway.

I also saw about half a dozen windmills in Alkmaar, which I plan to visit at some point.

Brugge Mills

There were four mills in Brugge. The mills here are lower tech than the ones in The Netherlands; rather than just turning the top, the whole mill gets turned to face it towards the wind. All four mills were moved here from elsewhere in Belgium.

Bon Chiere Mil. This one looked like a rotatable outhouse to me. The stairs up it were very steep.
St. JanyHuys Mil. This one still operates and you can go inside (40 Belgium Francs). There wasn't enough wind the day we visited, so it wasn't running.
New Parrot Mil.
The fourth mill. I couldn't find the name for this one.

Other Mills

Oops. I didn't keep track well enough - here shots of a few mills whose name/location I can't remember. All the ones pictured below are south of Amsterdam, though.