Complaints about overcrowding, disruptive visitors and pressure on cities may feel like a distinctly modern problem, associated with places such as Venice in Italy, Barcelona in Spain or Amsterdam in the Netherlands. Yet Belgium experienced remarkably similar tensions a century ago, when a surge in foreign visitors sparked widespread unease among local residents.
Category: Experience
REVIEW | Brussels Airport The View lounge
Autumn 2025. We – Sam and Danny, Michel and Wille, and Timothy – are travelling to Japan for a quite classic tour of the Land of the Rising Sun. We are flying separately as we used miles. On the planning: Tokyo, Kanazawa, Shirakawa, Osaka, and Expo 2025, Hiroshima, Himeji, Miyajima, Kyoto, Nara, Nagoya, Hakone, and…
Flanders welcomed over 15 million visitors in 2025
Flanders is becoming increasingly popular as a tourist destination. In 2025, an estimated 15.4 million people visited the region, marking a 3% increase compared to 2024, according to provisional figures from Visit Flanders (Toerisme Vlaanderen). The number of overnight stays also rose to 36.3 million.
ANTWERP | ‘Plantin’s Plants’ exhibition at Museum Plantin-Moretus until 2 August 2026
In 2026, the Museum Plantin-Moretus in Antwerp is celebrating the 500th birthday of Carolus Clusius (1526-1609), a doctor and botanist from the Low Countries. With that in mind, the museum is inviting you to come and see the most attractive botanical images from the 16th to the 20th centuries from its own collections, with the…
TALLINN | LGBT tour at Vabamu Museum of Occupations and Freedom
August 2025. We’re travelling to the Baltic States: Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, and more specifically their respective capitals Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius. Are they interconnected by rail? Yes, but not in the most straightforward or userfriendly way possible. The Rail Baltica project should remedy this. Unsurprisingly though, this megaproject faces political and budgetary hurdles. It…
ANTWERP | Archaeologists uncover remains of 16th-century citadel of Alba
Archaeological research is currently being carried out in the South neighbourhood of Antwerp ahead of the redevelopment of Verschansingstraat and Pourbusstraat. During the excavations, remains of significant structures have been uncovered, including barracks from the 16th-century citadel of the Duke of Alba (Alva) and from its final 19th-century reconstruction. Numerous ammunition finds point to the…
JAPAN | Solo in Tokyo
Autumn 2025. We – Sam and Danny, Michel and Wille, and Timothy – are travelling to Japan for a quite classic tour of the Land of the Rising Sun. We are flying separately as we used miles. On the planning: Tokyo, Kanazawa, Shirakawa, Osaka, and Expo 2025, Hiroshima, Himeji, Miyajima, Kyoto, Nara, Nagoya, Hakone, and…
REVIEW | Carlsberg Aviator Lounge at Copenhagen Airport
Easter 2025. I’m visiting my uncle and aunt in Leland, North Carolina. It’s my first trip of two to the United States in 2025. I haven’t seen them live since February 2020 just before the first lockdown and I haven’t travelled to this area since 2019. I’m flying with SAS and Delta. The itinerary: Brussels…
TALLINN | Estonian History Museum at the Great Guild Hall
August 2025. We’re travelling to the Baltic States: Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, and more specifically their respective capitals Tallinn, Riga and Vilnius. Are they interconnected by rail? Yes, but not in the most straightforward or userfriendly way possible. The Rail Baltica project should remedy this. Unsurprisingly though, this megaproject faces political and budgetary hurdles. It…
BRUSSELS PRIDE 2026 | “When times get darker, we shine brighter”
Brussels Pride will return to Belgium‘s capital on Saturday 16 May 2026, celebrating its 30th anniversary with a strong political message about visibility, solidarity and resistance. Organisers expect around 200,000 people to gather in the city centre for the annual march and celebrations.