De Kerf: the viewpoint above the gap in the sea dune

The zeereep, the front row of dunes along the shore, is kept as closed as possible along this whole coast. Hold the sand, keep the water out. Here a gap has been dug through it, and that is what you look out over from the viewpoint. The name means “the notch”. In OpenStreetMap the point is listed as tourism=viewpoint, at 52.68637 north and 4.63972 east.

What is De Kerf?

A cut through the zeereep, with a viewpoint above it. Where the front row of dunes is normally a closed wall, here it has been opened up, so that sea water can reach the dune area behind it. It is not a gap punched by a storm and then repaired, it is an opening that is meant to be there.

How wide and how deep that cut is, and in which year it was made, we have not been able to get from a checkable source. Those figures are therefore not on this page.

Why would you deliberately dig open a sea defence?

A dune area completely cut off from the sea turns fresh. Rainwater stays, salt disappears, and the plants and animals that depend on salty, drifting conditions disappear with it. The landscape comes to a standstill.

A kerf reverses that. At high water and in storms sea water can get in, and it brings salt and sand with it. That is the whole reasoning behind an intervention like this: not to make it prettier, but to get things moving again.

Where exactly is the viewpoint?

At 52.68637 north, 4.63972 east. As the crow flies that is roughly 2.9 kilometres north of the centre of Bergen aan Zee and roughly 2.3 kilometres south-west of the village of Schoorl. So you are between those two, on the sea side.

Coming from further afield, calculated from the same coordinates in a straight line: roughly 40 kilometres north-west of the centre of Amsterdam, roughly 43 kilometres north of Schiphol airport and roughly 10 kilometres north-west of Alkmaar, the nearest city. Those are straight lines, not driving times.

As the crow flies is not the same as walking. Which paths lead there, where you can leave the car and how many metres you walk from which car park, we have not been able to establish. So look the route up on a map before you leave, and do not assume you can park right beside it.

Do you need a dune pass?

The site is registered to PWN, and for the Noordhollands Duinreservaat PWN requires an access ticket: a duinkaart (an annual dune pass) or a day pass. Whether this point falls within that paid area and what such a pass costs now, we have not been able to check. Count on needing something, and look it up at PWN before you go.

That is not a redundant question here: the Schoorlse Duinen a little further on belong to Staatsbosbeheer, the Dutch state forestry service, and there you pay no entrance fee. Two areas side by side, two different regimes.

Can the dog come?

For this point we do not know. We know the dog rules in the Schoorlse Duinen, but that is a different area with a different manager, so you cannot simply apply those rules here. What PWN allows in this spot goes on this page only once we have seen it at the source.

When is it worth going?

The picture hangs on the water. Sea water only comes in at high water and in storms, so what you see differs by the day and by the season. After a spell of storms the difference is greatest, and you can read from the sand how far the water came.

Do not expect an attraction. On the map this is a viewpoint, not a visitor centre: a look out over a stretch of dune that has been treated differently from the rest. What facilities are there on the spot we have not checked, so assume nothing.

Checked on 5 September 2026. What is missing here is missing on purpose: year of construction, dimensions, opening hours, rates, parking spaces, walking routes and dog rules we could not confirm with a reliable source. As soon as we can, they go in.