New Highpoint for the Netherlands

My brief vacation in Vermont over the weekend must have distracted me. Somehow I completely missed the news about the dissolution of the Netherlands Antilles on October 10, 2010. So it took an email message from loyal reader Greg to bring its true significance to my attention.

I’m not referring to the dissolution of the Netherlands Antilles per se, or the resulting creation of two new component nations within the Kingdom of the Netherlands. I’ll leave that story for all the normal geo-bloggers to cover. I’m not even talking about the date they chose to make this all happen, 10-10-10, although that’s really cool. Greg mentioned something completely different. And I have to agree that a certain special feature here creates a genuine geo-oddity.


We need to walk through a little history

International Border. Photo by howderfamily.com; (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
Dutch border on St. Martin

The Dutch cobbled together their colonies in the Caribbean Sea to create the Netherlands Antilles in 1954, an autonomous country within the larger Kingdom of the Netherlands. Thus, islands from two distinct groupings formed the nation: three from the Leeward Islands located southeast of the Virgin Islands (Saba, Sint Eustatius, and Sint Maarten); and three from the Lesser Antilles off the coast of Venezuela (Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao).

Aruba split from the Netherland Antilles in 1986, forming its own distinct nation within the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The remaining five islands continued onward within the structure of the Netherlands Antilles. Then three things happened on October 10, 2010:

  1. The Dutch government dissolved the Netherland Antilles and it ceased to exist
  2. Curaçao and St. Maarten followed the Aruban example and became autonomous nations within the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
  3. Bonaire, Saba and Sint Eustatius became Public Bodies of the Netherlands, informally known as “special municipalities”

The Oddity

It’s the third point that creates a geo-oddity. Bonaire, Saba and Sint Eustatius are no longer part of an autonomous nation within the Kingdom of the Netherlands. They are in fact now a part of the Netherlands proper. The Province of North Holland, which includes Amsterdam, has even invited them to join their state. They were still considering the offer as of the time I drafted this.

Former Highpoint

The Netherland’s highest point of elevation was until recently located at Vaalserberg. That’s a 323 m (1,059 ft) hill forming the Belgium-Germany-Netherlands (BeDeNe) tripoint. It was also once a quadripoint back when the Neutral Moresnet condominium still existed. It’s still noteworthy as a tripoint. However it’s not a national highpoint as of October 10, 2010.

New Highpoint

Now the Netherlands’ new highpoint has shifted 7,000 kilometres (4,350 miles) away to the island of Saba, atop the summit of the most pleasantly-named Mount Scenery.

Mount Scenery is a stratovolcano that’s possibly still active. It summits at 877 m. (2,877 ft.) above the sea. Instantaneously the highest Dutch elevation more than doubled. The Netherlands joins at least three other nations with highpoints far removed from their central territory: Australia (Mawson Peak on Heard Island), Portugal (Pico Island in the Azores, which I’ve visited), and the United States (Denali in Alaska, which I sort-of visited but never actually saw because it was too cloudy). I’m sure there are others but it’s still unusual.

Thanks for the tip, Greg!

Comments

8 responses to “New Highpoint for the Netherlands”

  1. Ian Avatar
    Ian

    Don’t forget about Spain, it’s highpoint is on Tenerife in the Canary Islands!

    1. Ian Avatar
      Ian

      also I was thinking about South Korea and it’s highpoint is on an island off the mainland, Jeju-do. It’s not as far away as any of the other examples but it does seem like a fascinating place…..

  2. James in NZ Avatar
    James in NZ

    You want a geographical oddity about this? The Dutch-French border is an oddity. It’s in the Caribbean! I sense a great pub quiz question about that one!

    1. Twelve Mile Circle Avatar

      Indeed, the situation in Saint Martin / Sint Maarten is a fascinating and not particularly well known geo-oddity. We discussed that one a couple of years ago.

  3. aletheia Avatar

    & having just bought the dollar & ditched the guilder
    they have actually become out islands of washington rather than amsterdam
    oops

    & so
    mount scenery turns out to be only the highest point in the district of columbia

    but seriously
    did you know the bedenl tripoint has been a quintipoint too

    let me tell you about it

    1. Twelve Mile Circle Avatar

      Neutral Moresnet.

      But I’m not going down this path again. Not even after the passage of eighteen months.

  4. aletheia Avatar
    aletheia

    [Comment removed by moderator]

    1. Twelve Mile Circle Avatar

      Thus demonstrating once again that the original decision to ban Aletheia Kallos was the correct choice.

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