The first time I ever drove abroad – September 2016 – I went to Belgium and stayed for 1 night only in Ypres (known locally in Flemish as Ieper).
Located in West Flanders a short distance from the Belgian/French border, it has become a place I routinely stop off at on when driving between the UK and Germany (and beyond).
If you’re in Ypres in the evening be sure to go to watch the Last Post ceremony at the Menin Gate – it continued all the way through lockdown, just without spectators – and as of 1st July spectators are allowed to attend once more.
I also reccomend the Hooge Crater museum and, right in the centre, the In Flanders Fields museum.
Photos below…


