Any Good Digging Locations Close to Amsterdam?

**thekid** · 08-09-2012, 08:28 AM

I'm Visiting Amsterdam and was curious to know if there are any close battlefield sites, I heard digging might be illegal here and if that is the case I will enjoy the expierence of visiting it just as much. So if you have any locations please let me know!

all the best,
Stefan

**Feuerbach** · 08-09-2012, 10:33 AM

No battlefields near Amsterdam, well no wwII battlefields that is. You will have to do some travelling, but Holland isn't that big, so Nymegen, Arnhem, Eindhoven and even the forests on the German border are not to far from Amsterdam. But I must add its not legal to digg/search on all those sites, Arnhem is a big no-no.
You could even travell south towards Belgium, and visit the battlefields around Ypres. Myself I did alot of digging in Antwerp, but haven't been there in ages now. Don't know if the site still exists.
Try doing a bit of homework on the matter, the laws and locations of battlefields in Holland and Belgium! Good luck!

**Steve T** · 08-09-2012, 10:46 AM

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it is illegal in both Holland and Belgium.

**pauluspaul** · 08-09-2012, 04:37 PM

Hi there,
Your digging in antwerp was mostlikely in Top Hat no?
I sometimes dig there ass well, but it is practically empty now. I am very intrested in your finds there.
If you digged somewhere else there, i am also very intrested.
I live there, for it

awaiting your reply with good feelings.

greetings

**Feuerbach** · 08-09-2012, 05:41 PM

by Steve T

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but it is illegal in both Holland and Belgium.

It is not illegal to search in Holland. It is just a little complicated; it's illegal to detect and digg in the areas that have a so called APV, like Arnhem, but it is not illegal to detect in the places without the APV. You would like you to ask for permission from the landowner, in case it is a public forest it would be illegal, but nobody realy cares. Just fill in the holes, and leave no mess.
Belgium is a different ball game; they themselves have no clue what the law says about the use of a detector. It was banned some years ago, but again on privat propety and with permission it is aloud. Nearly all the country's in Europe have signed the Malta pact, forbidding the use of a metal detector searching for artifacts older than 50 years.
The only country's to realy avoid are France, Spain (inlands), Greece, Portugal and parts of Germany.
The site in Antwerp was (as pauluspaul mentiond) was a no-go area for years. Now they are building a new tunnel there if I'm not mistaken, and they don't realy care if you digg there anymore.
Pauluspaul, send me a PM about Antwerp, I have some cracking finds from the camp in my collection. As a matter of fact I was in Ghent last week, and planned a day on the camp site, but it was raining cats and dogs, as it does up north!