The Ardennes
Slouching like a great grey dragon high on Bouillon's central rocky ridge, Belgium’s finest feudal castle-ruin harks back to AD 988, but it's especially…
Must-see attractions in Wallonia
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Wallonia
This 11th-century church was part of one of Europe’s foremost abbeys, founded in 648. It's 102m long with a soaring multilevel western facade topped with…
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Wallonia
Set on the grounds of a former Cistercian Abbey, this 65-hectare park is home to more than 5000 animals (including pandas, koalas, gorillas and lemurs)…
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The Ardennes
This highly recommended modern museum takes you into the heart of WWII, with an audio guide featuring four imagined voices of civilian and military…
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Wallonia
This superb museum mostly covers Mons' experience of the two world wars, though the constant sieges of this town's turbulent history are also mentioned…
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Namur
Dominating the town, Namur's mighty fortress covers a whole hilltop with ramparts, tunnels and grey walls. What you see now is more 19th and 20th century…
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The Ardennes
For one of the best industrial-experience tours you'll find anywhere, don a hard hat, jump in the cage lift and descend through a pitch-black moment into…
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The Ardennes
A Cistercian monastery since 1132, Orval's abbey complex was wrecked in 1793 by anti-religious French Revolutionary soldiers. Rebuilding only started in…
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Wallonia
The inventive and touchingly nostalgic Hergé Museum celebrates the multitalented creator of comic-strip hero Tintin with an engaging, inventive and…
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Wallonia
The world’s tallest ship lift (completed in 2002), raising or lowering gigantic ‘baths’ 73 vertical metres, is on a pharaonic scale, as was the €150…
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Wallonia
Dominating Tournai’s skyline are the five spires of its remarkable cathedral, which survived WWII bombs only for a freak 1999 tornado to compromise its…
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The Ardennes
Some 10km north of St-Hubert towards attractive Nassogne village, Fourneau St-Michel is a superb open-air museum featuring around 50 historic buildings…
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The Ardennes
Playing a 21st-century Willy Wonka, one of Belgium’s foremost chocolatiers has turned his modern factory into a superb interactive museum experience. Walk…
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Wallonia
This classic fortified farm is around 20 minutes’ walk southwest of the Butte du Lion. Had Napoleon broken through here early in the battle, everything…
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Liège
South of Liège's centre, this excellent gallery hosts many high-profile temporary exhibitions but always shows elements of its own fabulous art collection…
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Wallonia
Founded in 1242, this is Belgium’s only medieval convent-farm-hospital complex to have survived reasonably intact. Laboriously restored, it demonstrates…
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Liège
Splendid Grand Curtius unites four disparate museum collections in the former mansion-warehouse of a 16th-century Liège arms dealer. The building's red…
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Wallonia
Inaugurated for the 2015 bicentenary, this showpiece underground museum and visitor centre at the battlefield gives some detail on the background to…
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Wallonia
One of Europe’s biggest and most impressive photography museums, it has an engrossing collection of historic, contemporary and artistic prints. Don’t miss…
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Wallonia
Started in 1785, this tiny affair is Belgium’s last traditional steam-operated brewery. This wonderfully authentic family enterprise is best known for its…
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Wallonia
Originally set out in the 17th century by the dukes of Arenberg, the Parc d’Enghien incorporates vast stands of woodland, fountains, statues, a tiny …
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Liège
Arguably Liège's most fascinating church, this architectural hotchpotch was founded in 1015 and retains a heavily patched-up 1170 west end whose…
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Wallonia
This cave system has fewer stalactites than nearby Han, and handling the 626 relatively steep steps is more physical. However, the small-group visits give…
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Liège-Guillemins Train Station
Liège
Liège's main train station, around 2km south of the centre, is an incredible 2009 icon designed by Santiago Calatrava. Great for semi-abstract landscape…
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The Ardennes
The scenery west of Bouillon reaches a memorable climax at Rochehaut, where a long balcony surveys a glorious view down across a perfect river curl…
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Wallonia
Tournai’s gorgeous triangular main square is ringed with cafes in fine gable-fronted guildhouses merrily flying guild banners. Kids play in ‘dare-you’…
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Namur
Baudelaire reputedly described this remarkable baroque church as a ‘sinister and gallant marvel’. With purple marble columns, black stone arches,…
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The Ardennes
The once-gigantic church of the Stavelot-Malmédy prince-abbots was destroyed in the aftermath of the French Revolution. But behind the archaeological…
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The Ardennes
One of the world's best-known glassworks in the 19th and 20th centuries, Val St-Lambert has made lead-crystal masterpieces within this former monastery…
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Wallonia
Nestled in a pretty wooded dell are these extensive, ivy-clad ruins. Once one of Belgium’s biggest monastic complexes, Villers was never rebuilt after the…
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Domaine Provincial de Chevetogne
Wallonia
Around 12km north of Rochefort, this 550-hectare park is a wonderland for families. Chevetogne is set with forest trails, a natural-history museum,…
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The Ardennes
Hidden beneath partly wooded hills 1.7km southwest of Hotton, the Grottes de Hotton are some of Belgium’s most awesome caves. Sculpted grottoes sprout…
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Wallonia
The Lesse tunnels underground for some 8km to form a magnificent cave system that is the region’s biggest tourist draw. Guided visits (English often…
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The Ardennes
Few of Belgium’s numerous castles have an interior that beats the memorable Château de Modave. The most arresting of the well-preserved 1673 stucco…
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Liège
Built in 1888, this palatial building has a deep-eyed bust of Darwin on its central pediment, best spotted from the river-ferry as it approaches the Pôle…
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The Ardennes
A possible starting point for hikes, this impressive information centre 200m west of the Eupen–Bütenbach road has a big hooded fire hearth, a cafe serving…
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Wallonia
Chimay’s world-famous Trappist beers have been brewed since the 1860s at austere Abbaye Notre-Dame de Scourmont, 9km south of Chimay. There are no brewery…
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The Ardennes
About 4km west of Durbuy, the photogenic Château de Petite Somme is a 13th-century structure with appealing neo-Gothic additions. However, touring the…
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The Ardennes
Some of the Ardennes’ best beers are brewed by rapidly expanding La Chouffe ('The Gnome'). The name, and hence the cartoon figures on each label, is a…
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Basilique des Saints-Pierre-et-Paul
The Ardennes
This impressive grey stone church has a netting-draped late-Gothic interior with fine 1733 oak choir stalls topped by cross-headed stags. The stag symbols…
