The historic Dutch village of Zaanse Schans is well known for its windmills, which a heck of a lot of tourists want to go to see. Indeed, they are some of the most picturesque examples in the Netherlands, and easy to get to from Amsterdam. Last year, 2.6 million people visited - a gigantic amount for a small place with a resident population of just 100.
It is far too many tourists, says the local council. And so, it has announced that from next spring, it will charge every visitor from outside the area €17.50 ($20.50; £15) to enter, to try to control the numbers. It's very rare for a community to take such a measure, but talking to Marieke Verweij, director of the village's museum, you can understand why they want to do this.
In 2017, we had 1.7 million visitors… this year we're heading for 2.8 million, she says. But this is a small place! We just don't have room for all these people! Worse, says Marieke Verweij, visitors often don't know that people live here so they walk into their gardens, they walk into their houses, they pee into their gardens, they knock on doors, they take pictures, they use selfie sticks to peek into the houses. So no privacy at all.
I leave the museum and walk past a coach car park in the general direction of the windmills. I probably shouldn't say this, as it's just going to make the problem worse, but these are some fabulous windmills. One of them is wooden and painted green. Another has thatched walls. Every so often the wind picks up and their sails go round. It's a fine sight - and one most people would want to get a picture with.
A lot of people are doing just that, of course. The windmills are actually still quite a long way off but, at the best spots, visitors form very civilized selfie-queues. There's a bit of a queue also at a little bridge that leads over a canal towards the windmills. As I edge forward I hear Chinese, English, Spanish, Arabic, Italian, and Russian.
The plan is to get everyone to book and pay online. The sort of thing you often have to do now to visit museums post-Covid. The sweetener for tourists is that for the €17.50, they get admission to two things they currently have to pay for separately anyway – entry to the museum and to the inside of the windmills.
If only half the current numbers keep visiting after the admission charge is introduced, annual revenues will be around €24.5m. The council plans to spend the money on maintenance of the windmills and on new infrastructure. New toilets, for example. But the shop and restaurant owners are not happy at all.
The stores, it should be said, are a bit of an attraction in themselves. The staff wear traditional costumes in the cheese shop, they do clog-making demonstrations in the shoe store. And they are located inside old and beautiful wooden houses. The antique and gift shop, for example, dates from 1623.
The planned entrance charge is threatening the livelihoods of Zaanse Schans's retailers and restaurant owners, says Sterre Schaap. She co-runs the gift shop, which is called Trash and Treasures. It's awful. It will mean that people who don't have a big wallet won't be able to come here, says Ms. Schaap.
I wander up to the windmills, past a young woman who’s photographing her friend, and a couple from Germany who are taking a selfie. Up on the balcony of one of the windmills, looking out at the impressive flatness of Holland, I get talking to Ishan from Canada. I don't know if I'd pay the €17.50 to come here. It's a bit steep just to see a couple of windmills, he says.
But Elisia, who is Albanian, grew up in Greece, and now lives in the Netherlands, says she would definitely pay that amount. These villages, they are not so big, and they lose their charm when there are so many tourists, she says.
Steve, who's over with his family from Massachusetts in the US, has been doing his calculations and can see the good side of the upcoming charge. Cheap people like me, says Steve, look at the windmill and say 'nah, I'm not gonna pay extra to go in there', but if it's all included I wouldn't hesitate.
The deal is also a sign of the times. Rachel Dodds, a professor of tourism at Canada's Toronto Metropolitan University, points out a few comparable cases. Bhutan charges an entry fee per day to visit the country. Venice, of course, is probably the most famous one with €5 for day trippers, she says.
As I wait for my bus to leave Zaanse Schans, a busload of people arrive, swiping their credit cards to pay for their rides. Those who arrive in a few months time will be digging around for pre-paid entry tickets, too.
