Zuiderzee Museum
Take a trip around the IJsselmeer in the Zuiderzee Museum
A sightseeing tour around the IJsselmeer lake is a popular outing. Make it a one-stop trip!
The Zuiderzee Museum takes you on a one-day tour from the town of Enkhuizen, across the Afsluitdijk dike and the Wadden Sea Islands to Frisian towns like Hindeloopen and Makkum, and back again to the province of Noord-Holland where you’ll visit the villages of Marken and Volendam.
Avoid the crowds in Volendam and take your groups to the Zuiderzee Museum, where they will walk the tiny streets with authentic Zuiderzee cottages, take in the aroma of freshly smoked fish, photograph their (grand)children in traditional Volendam costumes, taste farm cheese in the cheese warehouse and enjoy a short boat ride from the car park to the outdoor museum.
Let your group visitors relive the Zuiderzee life of yesteryear in a single day!
Combined trips
The Zuiderzee Museum can easily be combined with:
- the Cheese Market in Alkmaar
- the Afsluitdijk Wadden Center
- the steam tram from Hoorn to Medemblik, or v.v.
- UNESCO world heritage site Schokland
If you make the right combinations, you can tell the complete IJsselmeer and Zuiderzee story of the past, present and future!
Never far away!
The Zuiderzee Museum in Enkhuizen is closer than you think. The new road between Hoorn and Enkhuizen has cut travel time between Amsterdam and Enkhuizen to a mere 50 minutes. If you have arranged accommodation in the central part of the Netherlands, it only takes 20 minutes to get to our car park if you take the dike from Lelystad.
Story of a rich culture
The Zuiderzee Museum in Enkhuizen revives the stories of people who once lived on the shores of the Zuiderzee. See, hear, taste and smell everyday life around the Zuiderzee as it was before the Afsluitdijk (IJsselmeer Barrier Dam) changed the sea into the IJsselmeer in 1932. The Zuiderzee Museum is oriented toward the history, the current situation and the future of this area. It focuses upon the themes of water, crafts and communities. This story is visualized in the Outdoor Museum with historical buildings, and in the Indoor Museum with thematic exhibitions.
Outdoor Museum
The Museum ferry carries you across the IJsselmeer to the Outdoor Museum where you can take a walk through history. The open-air section covers 15 acres and accommodates authentic buildings from the former Zuiderzee region, such as a church, a fish-curing shed, a mill, a cheese warehouse, shops and dwelling houses from the surrounding fishing villages. You can help craftspeople in the Marker harbour making nets, produce a rope at the rope-maker’s workplace, give the housemaid a hand, or enter into a conversation with the ‘inhabitants’ from the former island of Urk. A number of presentations offer a modern interpretation of traditional crafts, materials and themes.
Indoor Museum
The Indoor Museum is the treasure chamber of the Zuiderzee. Temporary exhibitions display the rich collection of the Museum. For example the exhibition Journey around the Zuiderzee presents highlights of the collection and personal stories of life in villages around the former Zuiderzee. The Indoor Museum also has the largest collection of wooden ships in the Netherlands. These historical wooden ships belong to the most extraordinary items in the Museum’s collection. With history, photography, traditional costume, design and an attractive and educational family exhibition, the Indoor Museum offers something for everyone.
