Belgium

Belgium has found it hard to shake off a reputation for dullness. Certainly the coast - almost entirely built up - is undistinguished to the point of blandness, but elsewhere there are handsome brick-built cities with a great sense of history.
Bruges is the most attractive of all, a canal-laced city dubbed the 'Venice of the North', graced with fine old merchants' houses. There's more fine waterside architecture and a notable cathedral at Ghent, while Antwerp is a lively cultural city with a medieval printing works. Brussels, the capital, has a magnificent central square as well as some surprises - including a legacy of art nouveau architecture that by far outstrips Paris. For a country small in size and population, Belgium has a surprisingly diverse mix of people and languages. There are cultural as well as linguistic differences between the Flemish, who mostly live in the wealthier northern towns, and the poorer Frenchspeaking parts of the country in the south. Bureaucracy, signposts and life in general are complicated by the need to produce all information in at least two languages (Dutch and French). In the northern towns of Flanders, the Flemish often prefer to be addressed in English rather than French.