Instead of Bruges: Ghent, the Flemish City That Lives for Its Own People

Bruges is a picture-postcard city: perfect, restored, and filled with tourists following a coloured umbrella in a guided group. If you love Flemish architecture but prefer a city that lives for itself — with students, markets, nightlife and a genuine cultural scene — go to Ghent.

Ghent is Belgium's third largest city by population, but its medieval historic center is compact and spectacular: the Graslei and Korenlei — the canal quaysides facing each other — form one of Europe's most beautiful urban backdrops, with the medieval guild houses mirrored in the water. In the evening, lit by lanterns, Ghent's canals are magical.

The Adoration of the Mystic Lamb by the Van Eyck brothers — the most important polyptych in Flemish painting — is housed in Sint-Baafskathedraal and has been restored to reveal colours of startling vividness. The Ghent Altarpiece is considered one of the most influential works in art history, and here you can admire it at leisure, without the crowds of Amsterdam or Paris museums.

The Castle of the Counts of Flanders — the Gravensteen — is a medieval fortress in the heart of the city, with a torture chamber that is Europe's most ironically terrifying museum (the captions are written with dry Flemish black humour). The view from the battlements over the city's rooftops is exceptional.

Ghent is a university city (Belgium's second-largest by student population, after KU Leuven) and this gives it an energy Bruges simply lacks: bars, clubs, ethnic restaurants, contemporary art galleries. The Patershol quarter — medieval lanes lined with restaurants in seventeenth-century houses — is the city's gastronomic heart. The beer scene is extraordinary: Gruut Brewery produces beer without hops, using a medieval blend of herbs.

Eating in Ghent is an adventure: waterzooi (chicken or fish stew in cream), stoofvlees (beef braised in beer), and Ghent's gaufres are different from those of Brussels — thinner, crispier, with pearl sugar. Thursday is 'Veggiedag' — the city's official vegetarian day, a tradition unique in Europe.

Ghent is reached from Brussels in thirty minutes by train, from Bruges in twenty-five, from Antwerp in an hour. Brussels airport is forty minutes away. Accommodation costs less than Bruges and far less than Brussels.