Hasselt's green city tour

When you leave Hasselt (V) station, walk onto Monseigneur Broekxplein on the right and take the second street on the left, Geraetstraat. You have left for an elongated city tour that takes you through the city center and a piece of greenery through the outskirts of the city. You sometimes take an unavoidable part next to road traffic for granted. Heilig Paterke At the end of the Geraetstraat, choose the Kon on the right. Avenue astrid. At the traffic lights you cross the Leopoldlaan, enter the Diesterstraat and pass on the right, at number 10, the clothing store of fashion legend Stijn Helsen. Hasselt is in more ways than one capital of taste. A little further on, at his second shop on the corner, take the Dr. Willemstraat on the left. The doctor lived in house number 28a. He discovered a vaccine against lung disease in cattle and saved the Hasselt genever in one effort (see Pasar 10/2013). • Opposite you walk into the Lombaardstraat with its former governor's residence and court of first instance. Take the Schrijnwerkersstraat on the left and you walk straight to the Sint-Rochuskerk 1 of the Friars Minor and the burial chapel of Father Valentinus Paquay, better known as the Heilig Paterke. People are always praying around his grave monument, his image on the tomb gleaming with endless touches. Studying in a cell Turn left now into Minderbroedersstraat and right through Isabellastraat. Cross the Molenpoort and go straight ahead into the Gasthuisstraat with its Fashion Museum, the former grey sisters monastery. Further on the Demerstraat and into the Witte Nonnenstraat. • At the fork, keep left over the cobblestones. You will pass the Jenevermuseum (closed until autumn) and salute the proud bronze statue of Dr. Willems again. Note the row of miniature cows on the pedestal. • Turn your back on Willems and cross the Jeneverplein straight ahead. Then carefully cross the Martelarenlaan to the old prison 2, beautifully restored into a law faculty. Feel free to walk in during the week and see how the students block their course in a cell. You can also eat in prison restaurant 't Gerecht. Even the cooks do their work from a few cells. Tree calendar Back outside, take the Martelarenlaan on the left (right, if you didn't go inside) to the Kol. Dusartplein. First, cross the Kon. Boudewijnlaan, which you walk up to the left. Not a hundred meters further you will pass a piece of old barracks wall (see box WWI).• At the Wijngaardstraat you follow the street down, along the graffiti wall. Dive left into the tunnel and then two bridges on the right. Then diagonally left and past the cafeteria of the swimming pool the Kapermolenpark 3 with nice playground. There you follow the Celtic tree calendar in a wide bend on the paved sandy path. It seems that our distant ancestors also divided the year into periods, each represented by a tree, which was then attributed character traits. • With the view of the blue water tower and the bricks of the fire tower, take the asphalt on the left and after fifty meters the earth path again on the left, with the pond on your left. This way you get to the Japanese garden 4, in spring and summer a gem and definitely worth a visit (open from April to the end of October. Tickets: 5/4 euro, 12 y. free). • At the entrance of that garden, walk left along the cycle path, which you continue to follow a little further in the direction of cycle junction 98. You step the Gouv. Verwilghensingel underneath, then right. Just an unsociable part along a few parking lots and after 100 meters, opposite the Syntra building, on the right via a bridge over the Demer. Keep left along the parking edge of Plopsa Indoor and all over that site. Wave action You come back to an asphalt road with car traffic, the Trichterheide. Cross it carefully, while you can already see a sandy path between the trees diagonally to the right in front of you. This is how you walk onto the grounds of the Flanders Nippon Golf Club, another sign of the friendship with the Land of the Rising Sun. A beautiful piece of greenery, but you are not allowed to walk everywhere. A golf ball against your kanis and you can forget about this walk. Actually, it is simple: walking along the shell paths is not possible. So you walk straight ahead, onto the paved dirt path. You quickly turn left, then right again on the Demer bank and 100 meters further left again over the bridge, following the other Demer bank. You come back on mounted asphalt Godsheide and choose right, crossing the bridge. At the traffic lights, carefully cross the busy Universiteitslaan and turn right onto the parallel bicycle and pedestrian path past the Kinepolis cinema and the modern provincial building. Fortunately, you do not have to cross busy intersections, but you first cross the Gouv. Verwilghensingel and further on the Voorstraat with an underpass. • Then you walk straight ahead via the Dijkevoetweg (not signposted) and the Willekensmolenstraat past the water tower and the fire station. You had already seen it from the other side. Did you know that that fire tower with its copper roof is there to hang the fire hoses to dry after use? You continue straight along SintJansplein and through Congostraat until you reach Kol. Dusartplein where you were earlier. 't Stad In Walk along the facades to the left of Dusartplein and cross the traffic axis at the traffic lights at the newsstand via the zebra crossing and thus into the Maastrichterstraat. Ready for some cornering, because we dive into the City again. In front of the old refugie house of the abbey of Herkenrode is the statue of the Piot. Rightly so, because until 1945 there was already a barracks here. • A little further on you have the Stadsmus on the left, the former hotel Stellingwerff with the pleasant Garden Café around the corner. At the Stadsmus you walk straight ahead into the Capucienenstraat (see tip). • After 50 meters already turn right onto the square with the benches. The modern building diagonally to the right in front of you is the tourist office. You walk around it on the right, back into the Maastrichterstraat and after 50 meters turn left into the Kadettensteeg. You will arrive at a small green city oasis with benches and a statue of actor Luc Philips, known to every fifty-year-old as pastor Munte from Wij, Heren van Zichem. Walk straight along the façade of restaurant Kookpunt and leave the courtyard on the right. • Now turn left into Hemelrijk and at the Botermarkt with the Baptopillo by artist Panamarenko turn left. Immediately turn left again onto the Fruit market, around the SintQuintinuskathedraal to the Vismarkt. On the left again onto the Maastrichterstraat to the image of the Borrelmanneke, where you stroll through another piece of Maastrichterstraat on the right to the Grote Markt with its eateries and terraces. • Right in front of you a large half-timbered house, a pharmacy. There you step straight into the Kapelstraat and past the VirgaJesse basilica until you reach house number 39. Right in front of that store, you step into an unnamed alley past a poopy design store, housed in the old eclectic-style post office building. You arrive at the Havermarkt, which you follow on the right and via the Ridder Portmansstraat to the busy De Schrievellaan. You cross it and straight on the Bampslaan with its Literary Museum (no. 35) to the station. You also get the view of that special new courthouse.