Belfries & Old Towns Guides

53 guides

Belgium's belfries are civic towers rather than church spires, and 56 surviving examples in Belgium and France share UNESCO status. Bruges is where the type is easiest to read: the Belfort rises straight off the Markt with the city halls beneath it, and any first loop through the old town can be built around the climb, the carillon and the view. Ghent sets its Belfort beside two other towers on the same skyline, with the Graslei and Korenlei quays and Gravensteen folded into the same half-day walk.

Smaller towns repay the detour. Namur's belfry is the Tour Saint-Jacques, a 20-metre tower built in 1388 and only given the belfry title in 1746, passed on the way between the citadel hill and the rivers. Tournai holds Belgium's oldest belfry, and Lier and Leuven both have towers where a carillon can be heard. Liège offers a different register altogether: the Prince-Bishops' Palace, the Perron and the 374-step Montagne de Bueren.

What trips visitors up is scale and timing. Some centres fit a morning, others a full day, and a climb eats into both. Reading a town by its tower first, then the streets around it, keeps the walk in a sensible order.