Bruges is half an hour north, and the two make a good pairing, but Roeselare deserves to be taken on its own terms: a working town of some fifty-six thousand people, built on textiles, food processing and trade, with a town hall on its market square that anchors the centre. Like most Flemish towns, Roeselare grew around a market and a civic building that announced the burghers' independence from lords and bishops, and the tradition of the town hall as the symbol of local self-government is still very much alive here.
Two things make Roeselare famous well beyond Belgium. The first is beer: this is the home of Rodenbach, the brewery whose sour red-brown ales aged in huge oak foeders define the Flemish red style. Order one on a terrace on the square and you will taste something closer to wine than lager. The second is cycling. West Flanders breathes bike racing, and Roeselare hosts KOERS, the museum of road cycling, a fine stop for anyone who rides on two wheels of any kind.
For motorcyclists, the surroundings are flat to gently rolling, laced with narrow concrete and brick roads between farms, poplar rows and villages with big brick churches. It is not dramatic riding, but it is relaxing, and the wind off the North Sea is your main opponent. Watch out for cobbles on village squares, cyclists in numbers you will not see elsewhere, and speed limits that drop to 30 or 50 in every built-up area, with cameras to enforce them.
The First World War is never far away in this province. Roeselare lay behind the German lines for most of the conflict, and the battlefields of the Ypres Salient, with Passchendaele and Tyne Cot, are only a short ride to the west. Fuel and food are trivially easy in town, so use the stop for a coffee, a waffle or a Rodenbach, then head north to Bruges or west toward the Salient.