Starting point Callantsoog

Callantsoog has been relocated several times. The first early medieval settlement lay two kilometres further west on a continuous beach ridge, surrounded by crescent-shaped dunes. Storm surges between 1100 and 1500 shifted and breached the beach ridge, burying the village under sand. The settlement was rebuilt on a small Wadden island and named ‘Callinghe in den Oghe’. A map from 1647 shows that it was no longer an island. Through successive reclamations, Callantsoog became attached to the mainland. The sea returned once more: the All Saints’ Flood of 1570 washed away the second settlement of Callinghe. The village was then relocated, including its church, to its present (third) site.  

• The red route runs through the Uitlandsche Polder, formerly known as Uytterlandt, passing low dune mounds and wet, low-nutrient grassland. Natuurmonumenten (Society for Nature Monuments) created this nature area in 2014. Cattle graze on the Uitlandsche Polder from June to September. The route then passes the overgrown Zijperzeedijk and runs to the Luttickduin and the Heinollen.

• The purple route first runs along the beach, then continues into the Zandpolder, rich in saline seepage. It returns past the Venne, restored to wet conditions in 1997, the Nollen van Abbestede (managed by Landschap Noord-Holland), and the bulb-rich Jewelpolder.

• The black route extends the purple route and turns north at the Nollen van Abbestede, running along the Rechtendijk. At the end of the tarmac, it continues straight ahead across grassland to the Noordschinkeldijk and returns along the Jeweldijk.

This route was the ‘Circular Walk of the Month’ in January 2024, in a feature written by the Westphil Wandelt bloggers. Read their walking report here.