Old town and port of Antwerp

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Directly at the Hard Rock Cafe you can walk to the inviting street cafes and impressive squares of Antwerp city center. The Large Market with its imposing buildings, the town hall and the guild houses, also impresses with a decorative fountain, the Brabo fountain in honor of the folk hero Silvius Brabo. This is said to have done the same to a vicious giant who cut off the hands of merchants who were unwilling to pay on the way to Antwerp. Hence the giant hand that is flung away from the stature like a discus.

Another highlight of Brabant architecture can be found right next to the Great Market: the Cathedral of Our Lady. Your tower has been a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1999. Four paintings by Peter Paul Rubens hang in the cathedral, including one of his most famous masterpieces: The Descent from the Cross, which he created in 1612.

It is only a few hundred meters from the Großer Platz to the port facilities. During our stay we were lucky enough to see the Polish sailing training ship Dar Młodzieży, a three-master built in 1981 in the Lenin shipyard in Gdańsk as a full steel ship. We saw the casting off maneuvers - impressive!

From the port facilities, pedestrians can comfortably get to the other bank through the Sankt-Anna-Tunnel under the Scheldt. Here you have an excellent view of the Antwerp skyline.

Picture 1: Cafes around the city center
Picture 2: Town hall, guild houses, Brabo fountain and Cathedral of Our Lady
Picture 3: To the port facilities
Picture 4: The Polish three-master "Dar Mlodziezy" casts off
Picture 5: Sint Anna tunnel under the Scheldt
Picture 6: Sint Anna tunnel under the Scheldt
Picture 7: The historic escalators of the Sint-Anna-Tunnel under the Scheldt
Picture 8: Antwerp skyline
Picture 9: Karin and Jürgen on the Scheldt
Video: The escalators of the Sankt Anna tunnel