Loos is a town on the southwestern edge of Lille, and its town hall belfry is part of the same UNESCO family as the medieval towers of Bruges and Ghent, though it is a much more modern member. In this corner of Europe a belfry was the symbol of a town's independence from lord and church, and when the industrial towns of the Nord built new town halls in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, they gave them belfries too, as a statement that they had grown up. Loos's tower, in brick and stone, does exactly that.
Let's be frank about the setting. This is the dense urban fabric of the Lille metropolis, with Haubourdin, Emmerin and Lille itself running into each other, and the riding is traffic, roundabouts and red lights. The Deûle canal runs nearby, with barges and towpaths, and the old textile and brewing past of the area is visible in red-brick mills turned into flats or offices. Loos was for a long time best known in France for its large prison, which has since been replaced, and for being on the outskirts of everything.
Still, it makes a sensible start or finish. The A25 and A1 motorways are minutes away, so you can be heading for the Flanders hills around Cassel, the battlefields of Artois near Vimy, or the Belgian border in no time. Once you leave the metropolis the land opens into the flat, wind-scoured farmland of French Flanders, with straight roads, big skies and the occasional slag heap rising out of the mining basin to the south.
For food, you are in the north, so think carbonnade flamande, beef stewed in beer, potjevleesch, and waffles from Lille's famous tea rooms if you head into the city centre. Beer here is a serious subject, and there are good regional brews in any bar. Fuel and shops are everywhere in Loos and the neighbouring towns. Watch out for cobbled sections that still survive in older streets of the region, slippery in the frequent drizzle, and for the very real speed camera density around Lille.