Nature reserves

West Zeelandic Flanders has an incredible number of places with a story to tell. If you know where to look, the landscape can explain its past. The mudflats and salt marshes of the Zwin nature reserve and the Verdronken Zwarte Polder (drowned black polder), the dunes, dikes and creek remnants of the Blikken and the Baarzandse Kreek, among others. All tell a story of the struggle against the water; sometimes the sea won, other times man. West Zeelandic Flanders is also a National Landscape— and with good reason!
 

NATIONAL LANDSCAPE OF THE SOUTHWESTERN NETHERLANDS

Beautiful things should be taken care of. To that end, the Government has designated West Zeelandic Flanders as a National Landscape. It is an area typical of the country's history and landscape. National Landscapes are not open-air museums but areas where people live, work and relax. West Zeelandic Flanders has seen heavy fighting throughout the centuries. The rough remains of its turbulent past are still visible in the landscape. The Kruisdijkschans, the Wallen van Retranchement and the Wallen van Sluis are remnants of military defence works from the Eighty Years' War (1568–1648), the States-Spanish Lines.