Bruges can be crowded in the summer, and yet there are some secret streets where tourists never walk. The Oliebaan is one of them. It feels as if you have left the overcrowded city behind when you turn down this ancient earth lane.
Squeezed between brown brick walls, it looks as if it leads nowhere. But keep on walking and you come to a muddy field with fruit trees growing next to the city walls and cows grazing on land once owned by Cistercian monks from the Abbey of the Dunes.
Derek Blyth’s hidden secret of the day: Derek Blyth is the author of the bestselling “The 500 Hidden Secrets of Belgium”. He picks out one of his favourite hidden secrets for The Brussels Times every day.
