Antwerp day out · Wortel

308 km from Antwerp

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Why this ride

From Antwerpen it runs 308 km to Antwerpen; allow about 5 h 19 of riding. On the way it passes Béguinage de Dendermonde, Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal, Béguinage de Hoogstraten and Wortel. It suits an unhurried touring pace.

Roadbook

1. Antwerp start

   Antwerp is a city that made its fortune twice and will tell you about both. In the sixteenth century it was the richest trading port in northern Europe, a place of merchants, printers and painters on the Scheldt, until war and the closing of the river sent the money elsewhere. Then the port revived, and today it is the second largest in Europe, a vast maze of docks, cranes and chemical plants running north of the old town, with about four hundred and sixty thousand people living in the city itself.

   At the centre, the Cathedral of Our Lady lifts its single tall spire above the old streets, and inside it hangs Rubens's Descent from the Cross, one of the great paintings of the Baroque. Rubens lived and worked in the city, and his house is a short walk away. Nearby, the Plantin-Moretus Museum preserves the printing house of the family who turned Antwerp into a publishing capital, with its sixteenth-century presses and type still in place. Around Central Station, a railway palace of stone and glass built in the early twentieth century, the diamond district still handles a large share of the world's rough stones.

   The riding is hardly the point here: Antwerp's centre is a tangle of cobbled lanes, trams and one-way systems, and the ring road, the R1, is among the busiest in Belgium, with heavy truck traffic and constant lane changes. Treat the city as a base and head out by the quieter roads to the east and north. The Campine country towards Wortel and Hoogstraten is flat, sandy and wooded, with long, quiet lanes between fields and pine, and the beguinage in Mechelen to the south, a walled enclave of small houses and gardens, is the sort of quiet that cities forget. Cobbles, tram tracks and wet leaves are the hazards, and the weather in Flanders can turn grey without warning.

   Fuel is no problem in a city this size, and neither is food. Go for a paper cone of fries from a frietkot with a dollop of mayonnaise, or a bowl of stoofvlees, beef stewed in dark beer. The old town has brown cafes that serve Belgian beer by the glass, and the sweet shops sell Antwerpse handjes, small biscuits shaped like hands, a reference to a legend about a giant and a severed hand. May and September are the best months, when the terraces are open and the light is gentle on the stone.

2. Béguinage de Dendermonde sight

   Push open the gate of the Dendermonde béguinage and the traffic noise of the ring road simply drops away. Inside is a quiet triangle of grass, whitewashed houses with green shutters and a modest church, where for centuries communities of beguines lived. These were laywomen who chose a shared religious life without taking permanent vows, earning their keep with lacework, nursing and teaching. The béguinage is one of thirteen in Flanders listed together by UNESCO, and it is among the most intimate of them.

   Dendermonde stands where the Dender flows into the Scheldt, a strategic spot that made it a fortress town for most of its history. That cost it dearly in September 1914, when invading German troops set much of the town on fire. The béguinage survived better than many streets, and a few of its houses now hold small museums about beguine life and local folk traditions. Dendermonde is also home to the Ros Beiaard, a giant wooden horse carried through the streets with four young brothers on its back, a procession held only once a decade that draws enormous crowds and fierce local pride.

   Riding here is gentle Flemish lowland work. The country roads along the Scheldt dykes are flat and narrow, shared with tractors, cyclists in matching kit and the occasional heron lifting off a ditch. Wind is the real enemy; on a westerly day you will feel every exposed stretch. Expect cobbles in the old centre, low speed limits around schools and plenty of cameras, so ride as the locals do and keep it relaxed. Small foot and bike ferries cross the Scheldt along this stretch, and following the river's loops on the dyke roads is half the fun of a ride here.

   Dendermonde is a town of over forty thousand, so fuel, bike parking and food are all close. Settle on the Grote Markt under the belfry, itself a World Heritage site, with a Flemish beer and a plate of local fare, and enjoy the bells ringing over a square that has seen a great deal and still manages to look content.

3. Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal sight

   Rik Van Looy, one of the great Belgian cyclists of the 1950s and 1960s, was known as the Emperor of Herentals, which tells you something about the priorities of this town in the Kempen. Herentals lies on the flat heathland of the province of Antwerp, and in the middle of its market square stands the old town hall, built in the fourteenth century as a cloth hall, a lakenhal, when the town grew rich on wool and weaving. Its belfry is part of the UNESCO listing of belfries of Belgium and France, a symbol of civic pride and of the freedoms that merchants bought from their lords.

   The building has the look of a sturdy Flemish townhouse with a spire on top, and it has served as a market, a courthouse and a meeting place over the centuries. Around it, the square is lined with cafés and shops, and the old town gates of Herentals, the Zandpoort and Bovenpoort, still stand at the edges of the centre. The Gothic church of Saint Waldetrudis is worth a look too, with a famous carved altarpiece inside.

   The Kempen is not a place for mountain passes. The roads are flat and mostly straight, threading through pine forests, heathland and small villages, with canals like the Albert Canal and the Kempisch Canal running through the landscape. It is pleasant, easy riding with scents of pine and heather, but you will share the roads with very large numbers of cyclists, especially on weekends, and the speed limits are enforced. Look out for cycle paths crossing the road, tractors and the odd cobbled section in villages.

   With twenty-five thousand inhabitants, Herentals will not leave you hunting for petrol or a sandwich. The market square cafés serve good Belgian beer, and you will find frites stands and bakeries nearby. In late summer the heathland around Kasterlee and the Kempen woods turns purple with flowering heather, a lovely sight from the saddle.

   If you want history with your coffee, sit on the square and look up at the belfry, imagining the clatter of looms in medieval Herentals. If you want cycling lore, ask a local about Van Looy, and be ready for a long answer full of affection and pride.

4. Béguinage de Hoogstraten sight

   A béguinage is one of the most peaceful places in the Low Countries: a walled enclosure of small houses around a green courtyard and a church, built in the Middle Ages for béguines, women who lived a religious life of prayer and work without taking permanent vows. They could own property, leave if they wished and support themselves by weaving, teaching or nursing, which made the béguinages a unique form of female independence in medieval Europe. The béguinage at Hoogstraten, in the north of Antwerp province near the Dutch border, is one of thirteen Flemish béguinages on the World Heritage list, and it is a quiet, charming place, with whitewashed houses, a baroque church and a garden where time seems to slow.

   Hoogstraten itself is a pleasant small town with a long, wide main street lined with lime trees and dominated by the tower of St Catherine's church, one of the tallest church towers in Belgium at over a hundred metres. The original tower was blown up by German troops in 1944 and rebuilt after the war in its original style. The town is famous in Belgium for its strawberries, grown in greenhouses and sold at a large auction; Hoogstraten strawberries are considered among the best in the country.

   The landscape is the Kempen, a flat region of heaths, pine woods, sandy soils and small farms, with nature reserves like the Strijbeekse Heide on the Dutch border. Just across the border, the town of Baarle is a geographic curiosity, with Belgian enclaves within the Netherlands and Dutch enclaves within the Belgian enclaves; borders run through houses and shops.

   The riding is flat and easy, along quiet country roads through woods and farmland, with cycle paths separated from the road in most places. There are no real hills, but the scenery is pleasant, especially in late spring and summer when the heath flowers. Speed limits are strictly enforced, with average speed cameras on some roads in Flanders. Hoogstraten, a town of about eighteen thousand people, has fuel, shops, cafes and restaurants; the main street is a good place to stop. In early summer, try the strawberries with cream, and finish with a local beer; the Trappist abbey of Westmalle, famous for its beers, is a short ride to the southwest.

5. Wortel turn

   Wortel is a village in the Belgian Kempen, near the Dutch border, and it is the Belgian member of a World Heritage group whose other two parts, Frederiksoord and Veenhuizen, lie in the Netherlands. The story begins in 1818, when a Dutch army officer, Johannes van den Bosch, founded the Society of Benevolence, an organisation with the grand idea of rescuing the urban poor by sending them to work on farms in the countryside. The first free colonies were founded in the Netherlands, at Frederiksoord, and in 1822 the society bought land at Wortel, then part of the same kingdom, and opened a colony there. When Belgium split away in 1830 the colony remained in Belgian territory.

   The settlers were given a house, a plot of land and a cow, in return for working and living under strict rules, and many struggled on the poor sandy soil. Later the colonies became centres for orphans, vagrants and beggars, and the buildings grew into large institutions. In Wortel, the layout of fields, straight roads and brick farmhouses still follows the original plan, and the colony is a quiet, planned landscape in a region of heath, pine and farmland.

   Hoogstraten, a few kilometres away, is the nearby town, known for its strawberries and for a huge Gothic church, with a tower that dominates the plain. The country here is flat and sandy, with straight roads between fields of strawberries, asparagus and nurseries growing trees and shrubs. Riding is easy but not thrilling, though the roads are generally good and traffic is light. Cyclists are numerous, and on summer weekends the cycle routes are crowded. Winter fog and spring rain are normal, and the smell of pine and damp earth is strong.

   Hoogstraten has about eighteen thousand people, with fuel, supermarkets and cafes, and the Dutch border at Baarle is close. Try the local strawberries in season, and a Belgian beer in a village cafe. Antwerp is an easy ride away. The best seasons are spring, when the orchards flower, and summer, when the long evenings invite a slow ride.

6. back through Béguinage de Hoogstraten stop

   back through Béguinage de Hoogstraten comes up 193 km in.

7. back through Voormalig Stadhuis / Lakenhal stop
8. back through Béguinage de Dendermonde stop

   back through Béguinage de Dendermonde, late in the day.

9. Antwerp finish

   The route ends here after 308 km.

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