This city in Belgian Limburg grew up around a Benedictine abbey founded by the devout 7th-century Frankish nobleman Saint Trudo. That abbey was a major pilgrimage site in Medieval times, making the city rich and becoming one of the most powerful monasteries in the low countries. Sint-Truiden Abbey was suppressed and mostly demolished at the …
In the south of the Kempen region, Geel is a city that was much venerated by Medieval pilgrims. This was all for Dymphna, a 7th-century Irish princess supposedly martyred here. She was beheaded by her mentally ill father, who was struggling with the death of his wife and lusted for her because of her resemblance …
On the banks of the languid Durme River, Lokeren is a small city in the East Flanders. Lokeren’s greatest asset is the nature found effortlessly close city centre. From the train station you can hop on a bike, and Waasland’s immense cycle network can do the rest. Within touching distance is the largest nature reserve …
Named for a ford on the River Zenne, the city of Vilvoorde is about 10 kilometres north-east of Brussels and linked to the capital by the Brussels-Scheldt Canal. Vilvoorde gained city rights as long ago as 1198, and for decades until the end of the 20th century was associated with heavy industry. That chapter closed …
Home of the international playing card manufacturer Cartamundi, Turnhout is also unofficial capital of the Kempen region, a landscape of heathland, dunes and fens in the north-east of Belgium Turnhout had ties with the sport of hunting for hundreds of years, and a stag still adorns the city’s coat of arms. The Dukes of Brabant …
The largest city on Belgium’s coast is imbued with a royal flair that goes back to the middle of the 19th century when it became Leopold I’s resort of choice. Belgium’s aristocracy followed suit, and Ostend’s lofty status is confirmed by its genteel parks and regal monuments like the Sint-Petrus-en-Pauluskerk and the seafront colonnade, the …
An industrial city in Belgian Limburg, Genk experienced a surge of mining activity in the middle of the 20th century as it sits right on the Kempen coal basin. Those collieries were out of action by the 1990s, but their imposing architecture lives on at the C-Mine cultural centre and creative hub, and the Thor …
This medium-sized city, capital of Belgium’s Waasland region, has plenty going for it. One plus point is the largest market square in the country, dating back more than 750 years and so big that hot air balloons take off from this space during a festival in September. The 16th-century cartographer Gerardus Mercator was born just …
This industrial city in West Flanders came through a revival in the 19th century with the completion of the Roeselare-Leie Canal. In the decades that followed, Roeselare would be described as the Manchester of Belgium, and has a port on the canal still bustling with activity. In 1875 a young Albrecht Rodenbach, who later became …
One of Belgium’s oldest cities has a central square over a Gallo-Roman cemetery, and was the birthplace of Clovis I (466-511), founder of the Merovingian dynasty. Grand Place, lovingly reconstructed after firebomb raids in 1940, has a rare concentration of historical buildings. There are two World Heritage Sites here; a magnificent Romanesque-Gothic cathedral and a …