Tourism in Belgium
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This article is biased towards Flanders. Help Wikipedia by expanding it.
This article is about tourism in Belgium.
Belgium is especially famous to foreigners for its chocolate, beer and cycling heroes, like Eddy Merckx. Because it is such a small country, you can do very much in a short time. The best means of travel is by car and/or train. Although the country is small, using a bike to travel (like in The Netherlands) is discouraged because you could get lost in the overwelming traffic.
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Culture
Every large city has its own gothic cathedral, church, belfry or town hall.
Brussels
The capital Brussels is renowned for its architecture (gothic, Art Nouveau and Art Déco), the royal palace, its pubs, gallerias with expensive boutiques (oldest in the world) and its lifestyle. The Atomium is built on the Expo '58 site.
Flanders
Especially the historic cities Antwerp, Bruges, Ghent, Leuven and Mechelen are a must. The second largest city of Belgium, Antwerp, is the second largest port of Europe, and has yearly naval festivities. It has a world renowned diamond stock exchange. It's a very important cultural city, as it knew its height in the 17th century.
Ghent and Bruges, the "Venice of the North" are well known for their medieval cultural heritage. Both cities are criss-crossed by canals, and are unique in the world. Ghent is somewhat more trendy than Bruges. Ghent has the SMAK (Municipal Actual Art Museum), a modern art museum while Bruges' Groeningemuseum focuses more on the low countries' art in general: works include Paul Delvaux, René Magritte, James Ensor, Hieronymus Bosch, Jan van Eyck and many more.
If you want to dive into the nightlife, or like to visit campuses, visit famous student cities like Leuven, Ghent or Antwerp.
Wallonia
Bicycle Racing
Belgium has many internationally famous bicycle races, such as:
For cycling enthousiasts, a visit to Belgium should be combined with watching a cycling race. A famous place to spot cyclists is The Wall of Geraardsbergen (De Muur van Geraardsbergen in Dutch) and the Koppenberg. Belgium (especially Flanders) is undoubtedly the number one country in cyclo-cross.
Food, Drinks and Relaxation
Beer country par excellence, Belgium is a top visit for beer fanatics from all aver the world. Belgian people have a pub culture. For more info, see the list of Belgian beers. Belgian "national dishes" are Fries with Mussels, Rabbit with Prunes, and Eel in Green Sauce (Paling in't Groen in Dutch). Hasselt, the capital of the province Limburg, is famous for its jenever and speculaas. Antwerp is also a shopping paradise for fashion clothing, and there is a fashion museum, MOMU (Mode Museum), which also houses the prestigious fashion design department of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts. Prestiguous chocolate houses (Neuhaus for example) can be found in Brussels. You can also enjoy hydrotherapy and relax in the natural spas of Spa.
Nature and Natural History
Belgium is not very renowned for its nature. It is one of the most densely populated countries of the world, especially Flanders. Many dutchmen call Belgium a "planological disaster". But the nature is unique, resembling that of the Netherlands and northern France, but still different. In Flanders, the nature conservation group Natuurpunt owns and conserves otherwise lost pieces of nature, as does the government. If you like walking in relatively undisturbed areas, contact Natuurpunt.
Belgium has 67 km of coastline along the North Sea, in the province of West Flanders. Nice places to visit here are De Panne, Ostende, De Haan and Knokke-Heist. The accomodatons are very good, and there is plenty of choice, because the whole coastline is one big city, so to speak. Knokke-Heist has the natural reserve The Zwin, an estuary. The Zwin is a must see if you like bird watching. There is one nudist beach, in Bredene, and it is one of the most crowded in Europe.
The part of Wallonia south of the river Meuse and Samber is generally known as the Ardennes. It is an ancient mountain range, comparable to the German Eifel and the most natural region of Belgium with the highest peak at 694 m (Signal de Botrange). Of particular interest in the Ardennes are the High Venn and the Viroin valley.
Belgium is famous to paleontology fanatics for its Iguanodon collection. The Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences in Brussels houses 30 skeletons of Iguanodon bernissartensis. Also of interest is the Wallonian town of Spy, where in 1879 the remains of a Neanderthal have been found.
See Also
External Links
Official Flanders tourism site (http://www.visitflanders.co.uk)