What’s in a name?

ME AND MY ’VAN

Paul Knight... is retired and enjoys exploring Europe while, he says, “there’s still plenty in the tank!” He often stays near UNESCO World Heritage Sites

2016 Chausson Welcome 610. It’s comfortable, handles well and there’s plenty of power. The large garage easily accommodates all the kit

It was always the Zuiderzee when I was at school, then the Dutch changed it to IJsselmeer. I wondered why.

To find out more, I crossed a green blanket of fields below a grey sky. Through cold and low-lying mist, I reached Middenbeemster, a very small town on a faint ridge above the polders. Its centre of cobbled streets are in grid formation, with a church sheltered by tall lime trees. Yet this unpromising, modest town, inland from the IJsselmeer, is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. There must be more to this prestigious recognition, I thought.

History is behind this distinction. Four centuries ago, Middenbeemster was remote; a desolate, muddy hamlet on an ‘island’ in the marsh. Then engineers from Amsterdam thought that, by digging ditches and raising dikes, productive new farmland would form.

Money was invested and, within a few