Kasteel Nijevelt in Utrecht

You're standing in the De Milan Visconti Park in Veldhuizen, part of De Meern. Can you see the two little islands with bits of wall on them? That's all that's left of Nijeveld Castle, a medieval castle that probably went up here in the thirteenth century. It was certainly standing by 1288. It sat on a slightly higher ridge in the landscape, the bank of a long-lost branch of the Rhine. Roman ships once sailed there, and one was found intact very close by.