Around Villers-la-Ville and the Abbey

Even in ruins, the Cistercian abbey of Villers-la-Ville, dating mainly from the 13th century, is impressive. You can also get there by train (www.villers.be). Departure at the entrance of the abbey (V), also information office, opposite the Taverne du Moulin in the old abbey mill. With your back to the information desk, turn right through the narrow "Porte de Bruxelles" to the Châlet de la Forêt café. There you turn left into the Drève des Quatre Chênes. A hollow road uphill, which follows the wall around the abbey estate. First passed the entrance alley, then passed the gatehouse of the abbey farm 1. There you go straight. The road branches off into the wood of Bachet. You pass an arboretum and two chapels. At the edge of the forest you will meet a third: a nesting chapel at a crossroads. Right. The plateau road offers a rural and unsoiled view all around. 500 m after this last chapel, you turn left into a grassy road, which runs along the edge of the forest (marked in green and white). Past the forest, it turns left, but you continue straight, aiming for the other corner of the forest. There appears again the green and white arrow, which sends you to the left, along a meadow. At the next T, turn right. Where the downhill path tilts to the left, you leave it in the bend through the door and follow the footpath through the meadow. Then you descend via an adventurous forest road to the Thyle Valley. You cross the road and the river bridge. Here you have to turn left, but it's worth taking a look at the Château du Châtelet 2, a rough-looking medieval castle. It was the lords of the castle who invited the monks of Clervaux to Villers in 1146. Returning to your steps, you will see the old water mill of Châtelet at the bottom of the Thyle. In front of the bridge, you now choose the ascending path, not the bank path. A beautiful road digging on a worn limestone rock. At the next intersection, turn left. Now follows a panoramic descent to Villers. First of all, you come to the beautifully restored Franquenouille Farm (with guest rooms). At the entrance, you walk to the left. For example, you pass the old watermill of Hollers (13th-14th centuries), after which you follow the path of the bank along the canalized Thyle on the right. At the end, turn left again, towards the Romanesque church of Notre-Dame[3]. At the bottom of the church, you walk to the Place des Combatants. At the butcher Evrard, turn right and a few steps further, turn left again into the cobbled street of Mellery. Ignore Rue de Froide Bise on the right. At Villers station, you cross the railway tracks and walk to a square, with another butcher. You turn left, but be careful, past the corner house you turn right again. A calf biter that opens onto Boulevard Neuf. You follow it only 100 m away, to walk straight into the bend, in the path of Notre Dame. Stay on the ribbon of asphalt, ignore the terrain road. Another point of view, before diving into the forest. Then descent to Our Lady of the Afflicted 4, pilgrimage chapel of 1731. Shortening: If you go down Rue de l'Abbaye from the left, you will be back at the abbey after 500 m. If you want to enter the abbey forests now, cross the road straight. Along a beautiful pine forest, you come to a six-step approach: straight, like the GRroute (red and white). Then, let yourself be carried away by a hopping stream and forget about red and white. Beyond the railway, the stream flows into the Thyle, near the old abbey basins and the old water mill of Chevelipont 5. Diagonal to the left, cross the road and turn around the solitary house, into the climbing forest road. Where it leaves the forest, you continue between the houses, until you notice a white chapel on the left. Along it, a footpath goes deep into the valley. You then follow the valley of the stream to the left for 400 m, until the first branch on the left. A hiking trail, marked with yellow rectangle and also a GR path, takes you up the wooded hill to the abbey in the other valley.