Vloethemveld

Vloethemveld is a roughly 350-hectare mosaic of heath, pine and oak woodland, poor grassland and shallow ponds spread between Zedelgem and Jabbeke, just south of Bruges in West Flanders. What makes it unusual is that this quiet reserve was a fenced-off military domain for almost ninety years, a munitions depot from the 1920s until 2012, and you feel that past everywhere: dead-straight former barrack roads, old fire ponds, and grassy "merlons," the earthen blast walls once raised between ammunition bunkers, now overgrown and full of life. Because it stayed closed to the public for so long, nature took over undisturbed, and today three kinds of heather, dragonflies and birds of prey like buzzard and sparrowhawk do well here, with a heath tower (the Heidetoren) to watch them from. It is flat, open and calm, a genuine pocket of wildness surprisingly close to the city.

The heaviest layer of that history is the prisoner-of-war camp. Between February 1945 and September 1946 the British ran one of their largest POW camps in post-war Europe on this ground, and more than 150,000 German and Baltic prisoners passed through, with close to 67,000 held at the summer 1945 peak. You can walk the wider reserve for free on a network of seven marked trails from about 1.8 to 19 km, cycling is allowed on the designated routes, and there is a play area for kids, but the historical core, the old barrack streets and the Kamphuis where artworks made by prisoners are kept, can only be seen on a guided tour booked in advance through the local vzw. A few things worth knowing: treat it as the nature reserve it is, so keep dogs on a leash and stay on the paths; the terrain is exposed with little shade on a hot day; and if the camp history is your reason for coming, plan around the guided tours rather than expecting to wander the barracks on your own.