Along the castles around Montenaken

Montenaken brings us a gently sloping landscape and fascinating sites. The many castles that you will discover during your trip are particularly interesting: Nihoul Castle, Rivage Castle, Blehen Castle, L'Etoile Castle and Water Tower, beautifully spread over the 33 km. Then you can boast of having crossed three provinces: Limburg, Flemish Brabant and Liège.

1. With Montenaken Church on your right and Café Scala on your left, you cycle to the market. On the corner to the left is the café De Oude Markt, opposite the square restaurant De Oude Markt and a chip shop. Turn left before the restaurant and take the Stepstraat at the end of the Marktplaats. It is worth turning right before house No. 2 to see the chapel of the steps. Then walk along the Stepstraat, past the Stepshoeve (17th century) outside the village and further through fields and orchards. You are here in the land of the TV series Katarakt. In the distance is the E40. You cycle through a water catchment area and turn right at the crossroads, towards the Zevenbronnen Nature Reserve. Ignore a road on the right and pass a sign "only farm vehicles, cyclists, walkers and horse riders". Continue to follow this quiet road to a five-way with the white Sainte-Croix chapel from 1899, where farmers came to pray for their sick cattle. Turn left here, direction Cras-Avernas. You cycle across the highway and arrive a little further at an intersection. On the right, the castle of Nihoul is hidden in the green and the road to Bertrée passes. Continue straight, direction Trognée. Ignore Rue du Rivage on the right and continue along Rue G. Wauthier. On the right the castle Le Rivage with beautiful garden, on the left a farm of the castle. You pass the church and cross the rue roi Albert. Cross an intersection and choose the fork on the left at the crucifix. On the right, it goes to Trognée. You leave the village and turn right at the first intersection. Don't worry about back roads and go down gently. You resume on the road to Trognée and follow it to a tiled roundabout. Turn right and follow Rue Camille Moies. Immediately to the right is the access road to the church with the grotto of Lourdes and a castle farm behind. You pedal through an open agricultural landscape and at the crossroads, with a mini square left and right, straight ahead. After the Bertrée agglomeration sign, you arrive at a T-junction. Turn left, direction Poucet. You go up the rue J. Delange from the center of Bertrée. After a hollow road, you will be rewarded with an impressive 360° panorama. You cross the road again with the mini-squares, but now of course much further. Continue straight ahead and ignore all secondary roads until you reach a fork with a triangular square on the left. Turn right and follow the tourist Route des Blés d'Or. At the next fork, keep left and follow rue J. Chanet, direction Blehen. Between orchards and fields and in front of a curious sign: "République Libre de Blehen – Cradle of the Saint-Antoine vintage". At the intersection, you have to go straight. Here is the 'tree of the Republic', a linden tree. Each entrance to the village has a name in Walloon dialect. This is called "Pwète dé Téyou", which means "Lindepoort".
2. You now follow the rue de la Concorde and at the fork you choose the rue du Château on the left, after the old town hall, where the craft and didactic brewery of Flo is located today. The Confrérie de Saint-Antoine brews the cuvée Saint-Antoine. At the fork, turn right, pass in front of the domain of the castle of Blehen. At the crossroads, just before the church, turn right. You pass gently in front of the presbytery and the castle of Herzée leaving the village. Ignore Entre Deux Villes street on the left and turn left at the fork. At the crossroads, with the road to Arbolens on the left, you continue straight. You do the same thing at the next intersection. Here you follow the narrow path of Mont de Lens, which is made car-free with a pole after a house. At the end of this church road, you are at a protected view of the village with the square, the church and on the left the old Carmel beguinage, founded in 1343. Turn left and walk along the beautiful façade of the beguinage (current buildings from the 18th century) and leave the lime tree alley on the right. Don't worry about side roads and continue straight at the intersection until you reach a crossroads in Abolens with a curious church around the corner. It looks like an ordinary house and the bells, which are normally hung in the tower, are located across the street in a stone construction. Turn left, between the bells and the church. Ignore the road on the right in front of the cemetery, ditto with two secondary roads on the left and cross the intersection. Continue cycling towards Trognée and the water tower. Take a good 200 m before the tower the first narrow concrete road on the right, a slightly hilly road between fields. At the crossroads on the left, ignore the rue de Trognée and cross a grove to a T-junction. Turn right, on the other side of the stream, direction Boëlhe. Ignore Rue de Villereau and Rue de Crenwick on the left and continue cycling along Rue du Brabant. On the left a beautiful view of the castle L'Etoile and the church of Boëlhe. Leave rue d'Abolens on the right and turn left into rue Belle-Vue. You cycle along the castle wall and then take the rue de l'Eglise on the left. This hollow road takes you to the fork of the church. Now follow Rue de Berloz on the right. Leave the village by bike and turn left into Rue de Limbourg. At the crossroads, continue straight through the open landscape until you reach the T-junction. Turn right, pass a grove and Rue du Château d'Eau on the left. On the right, you see the farm of Villerau. Stop worrying about secondary roads and cross the TGV line and the motorway. On the other side, turn immediately right, direction highway and just after. Then you return to the open landscape. Through a tunnel of weeping willows, where a picturesque white house is also hidden on the left. Ignore a side road on the left, and when you enter civilization, take the first street on the right. It's one-way traffic here and you now follow towards exit 510. Turn left onto the T, then into the first street on the left and left again at the crossroads of the church of Vorsen. Cross the intersection and follow Reitstraat. You pedal through the orchards and stay left at the fork. At 181, he goes straight. It gently undulates through an open agricultural landscape. You pass the Two Tommen (2nd century AD) and continue straight on at two intersections. At the crossroads, choose the left. Just before the Montenaken agglomeration sign, take the Gemeentestraat on the right, direction exit 183. Ignore a road on the left and you can then admire the Neremhoeve and the Neremmolen 6 on the right. Continue cycling and turn left in front of the railway tracks. Just before the road turns right under the railway tracks, turn left into the hollow paved road, which quickly turns into a narrow paved road between the orchards. Ignore the secondary roads and continue towards the 181. At the end of the road, turn left and then right into Gezusters Dehasquestraat. On the T, turn right and at the intersection, follow the Brugstraat on the right until you start point.