Europe From Above (Europe from Above)

The Netherlands.

With a unique aerial view of one of Europe's smallest,

but mostly densely populated nations,

we'll reveal how the Dutch have battled against the odds

to create land and food for their growing population,

to cement this tiny country's place on the world's stage.

In this series, we'll take an aerial tour across Europe,

seeing its sights from a brand-new perspective.

Filmed from above, and over the course of a single year,

as the landscape transforms through the changing seasons,

we will uncover the culture, history, and engineering

that built the great European nations we see today.

The Netherlands sits in north western Europe.

It's bordered by Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east.

The country is home to more than 17 million people,

crammed into a space almost ten times smaller than their German neighbor.

A large proportion of the Dutch population live in densely packed cities

on the country's west coast:

Rotterdam, one of the world's busiest international ports,

The Hague, the seat of the International Court of Justice,

and Amsterdam, the nation's capital.

Here, historic tall houses sit alongside canals

that crisscross through the city.

But just outside this densely packed metropolis,

the landscape is strikingly different.

To the north east of Amsterdam, surrounded by water,

there's an enormous patch of land called Noordoostpolder.

Here, historic buildings and winding canals are replaced

by a patchwork of ultra-flat fertile fields.

Noordoostpolder's fields are the setting

to one of the world's most colorful transformations,

as spring arrives in the Netherlands.

For tulip farmers, Rob and Liesbeth Balk,

it's the moment they've been waiting all year for.

In March, Noordoostpolder

wears a winter coat of browns and dark greens.

But with the coming of spring, an incredible metamorphosis takes place,

the scale of which can only be truly appreciated from above.

Muddy fields burst into life,

with row after row of colorful flowers.

Reds, pinks, even oranges.

Every April, a tulip mega-bloom

engulfs this corner of the Netherlands.

For everyone who's driving through the fields,

you get a smile on your face when you see it.

It's one time a year, so it's only a few weeks.

It's beautiful.

But, amazingly, just before the tulip bloom hits its peak,

something extraordinary happens.

Farmers like Rob and Liesbeth take to their fields,

and go on a flower shredding rampage.

We are cutting the tulips off with a lawnmower.

It's a big one.

Today's job is to slice the heads off

this entire field of beautiful flowers,

leaving just the green stems and leaves behind.

An aerial view reveals row after row, systematically slashed.

This may seem like senseless destruction,

but it's a process that's crucial for the local tulip industry,

because decapitating the plants makes their bulbs stronger.

And Rob and Liesbeth are bulb farmers.

Tulip bulbs can survive for a few months before planting.

This means that they can be sold to buyers all over the world,

boosting the farmer's profits.

And the best way to get healthy bulbs,

is to decapitate the flower just before it fully blooms.

If you cut off the flowers, all the energy goes to the bulb

instead of the seed.

A good bulb for us, we try to make it as big as possible.

Bulb farmers like Rob and Liesbeth,

completely destroy Noordoostpolder's most colorful attraction in a matter of days.

For the people who are driving around, it's a shame.

But for us we are only saying green is very nice.

In a few short months, Liesbeth and Rob's big healthy bulbs

will finally be ready to harvest.

The flat landscape that makes the Netherlands perfect for growing tulips

is also home to a very different type of farming,

where giant white machines appear to sprout from the ground like beanstalks.

The geography of Europe forces south-westerly winds

to stream across the Netherlands.

Near the west coast of the country, they hit the small town of Rouveen.

An aerial view reveals something special about the scenery.

There are no hills or mountains anywhere to be seen.

With nothing in the landscape to block the incoming coastal breezes,

this is perfect place for Patrick Van De Kraats

to harness the power of the wind.

Patrick is a turbine builder,

and today he and his team are hoping to finish construction

of another of the massive wind machines

that provide electrical power to this part of the Netherlands.

I'm glad I'm not, uh sitting at the desk, uh, all day.

Yeah, that doesn't work for me. This job is better.

Today, Patrick's job

is to attach turbine blades to this soaring tower.

To do this, he has the unenviable task of climbing 85 meters into the air

to install the rotor.

We go upstairs, climbing up to the top.

You must not be afraid of the height.

Otherwise, you can't do this job.

Once he's safely in place,

Patrick must guide the blades into position.

A colossal crane lifts the 44-tonne rotor 85 meters into the air.

But fast winds at the top of the tower

make it challenging for the crane to hoist the blades

without them swinging.

So two giant cables wrap around the rotor

and lead to a team on the ground, who help steer it into position.

If one of the 40-meter long blades

were to strike the steel tower on the way up,

it could damage the two-million-euro turbine,

and the team on the ground are steering blind.

It's Patrick's job to be their eyes in the sky.

Okay.

It's a lot of responsibility.

It's all teamwork.

We connect together with walkie talkies.

Everybody has one, downstairs, upstairs.

Our exclusive bird's-eye view

reveals a sight impossible to see from the ground.

Patrick carefully guides the rotor, as the massive crane inches it forwards,

looking for the perfect fit.

Yeah.

The biggest challenge is, if the wind is blowing, the blades will turn.

You need to stay calm and think, and talk together with the ground.

It takes up to an hour of precision

to guide the 66 pins into their adjoining sockets

and lock the rotor onto the tower.

VAN DE KRAATS (off screen): Yeah. Super.

The team have brought it in bang on target.

Patrick secures the rotor and unhooks the crane.

It's a job well done.

This single turbine will generate enough energy

to power 2,000 homes.

Flat, low-lying land makes the Netherlands a wind turbine powerhouse.

But with just over a quarter of the landscape sitting below sea level,

this country is always at risk of flooding.

Today, state-of-the art sea defenses keep this land dry.

But the Dutch people have been battling against water for centuries.

In the Netherlands countryside,

day trippers escape the stifling cities

to cycle along the fields of windmills and dykes that dot the west coast.

Summer is finally here.

These windmills are a symbol of Dutch pride,

because it's thanks to them this landscape exists at all.

Over the last 1,000 years,

Dutch engineers have drained large parts of the sea

to create new land for farming.

South east of bustling Rotterdam,

at the meeting point of the rivers Lek and Noord,

lies the Kinderdijk.

This green patch of land

marks the genesis of this country's extraordinary transformation.

A bird's-eye view of the Kinderdijk

reveals a network of low fields and raised canals.

Along the edge of these canals

sit nineteen 300-year-old traditional windmills.

The tops of their wooden sails soar almost 30 meters into the air.

Unlike in most countries,

where these machines are used to grind grain,

here windmills pump water.

Ad Wisse is the guardian

of the Netherlands' most important national treasures.

Because of the uniqueness, it's a World Heritage Site.

I always need to inspect the windmills from bottom to top

to check whether they are in good shape.

Viewed from above,

the way these windmills interact with the surrounding waterways,

becomes clear.

As wind turns the huge 15-meter sails,

they power an enormous pump in the base of the windmill.

This drives water uphill,

through a hidden channel below the windmill,

draining water from the low-lying land on the left,

and dumping it in the raised canal on the right

where it flows away to the sea.

The windmills are arranged in long rows,

which lets them work together as a team to drain the water-logged grassland,

leaving behind fertile fields for farmers.

This is a low area below sea level,

and when people want to live here, they want to have dry feet,

and so the windmills have to pump up the water.

These wooden engineering wonders

helped this tiny nation grow nearly 20% larger.

And Ad's dedication to restoring these cultural icons

means they'll exist for future generations to enjoy.

I've been working now for 18 years at these windmills.

I feel really proud, yes.

20 kilometers north west of the Kinderdijk lies Rotterdam,

the country's second largest city.

In summer, tourists fill the cafes that line the historic harbor,

but it's Rotterdam's famous international port

that puts it on the map.

The port of Rotterdam is simply enormous.

With 42 kilometers of waterways stretching from the old harbor to the North Sea,

it's Europe's largest sea port.

Two decades ago, town planners decided

that this colossal container port just wasn't big enough.

But in the Netherlands, if you run out of land to build on,

simply build more land.

This is the Maasvlakte II,