L'abbaye de Villers-la-Ville et le Coureur des Bois

From the car park, walk along the Rue de l'Abbaye past the abbey of Villers, a former Cistercian abbey whose own site speaks of nearly 900 years of history, and its watermill. Follow the yellow rectangles of the Coureur des Bois (reference VLV3 in OpenStreetMap) up through the woods above the Thyle by paths and forest tracks. The way passes along the Rue de Chevelipont, crosses farmland and the edge of the forest to the north, goes along the Rue d'Heuval, comes back through the woods on a long track and passes the chapel of Notre-Dame des Affligés before the last stretch of the Rue de l'Abbaye to the start.

It is 10.1 km round with 192 m of ascent; allow about 3 hours. VISITWallonia gives its yellow-rectangle walk from the tourist office as 9.5 km, 3 h 15, medium, with 167 m of climbing. The grade is Moderate because of its length: the climbs are short, and the ground is forest track (43%), lanes and roads (33%) and paths (24%).

For a drive hunt (battue), hunters can ask for walkers to be kept out of the woods on the days and in the places where the hunt is dangerous; the Walloon government's page on forest use says the ban is shown by official posters with a red background, which the hunters must put where the public paths and tracks cross the hunted ground. The same page asks walkers to stay on the paths, keep dogs on a lead and make no fire. The government's ChasseOnWeb map shows only the hunts the administration knows of. The commune of Villers-la-Ville publishes a Walloon government notice that bans movement on the paths and tracks open to the public in the woods of the Ermitage, Gentinnes, Laroche and Tangissart on four days, which the notice gives; OpenStreetMap shows our line inside the Bois de l'Ermitage for about 1.2 km on the way back, and we cannot say which other paths of our line the notice covers. VISITWallonia's page says the walk goes through the ruins of the abbey; our line follows the marked route as OpenStreetMap shows it, on the public Rue de l'Abbaye beside the abbey, and does not go into the abbey grounds, which are ticketed (the abbey's own page gives the hours and prices).

The start is a mapped car park, shown as free in OpenStreetMap, about 200 m from Rue de l'Abbaye 53, the old tourist office (Syndicat d'initiative), where VISITWallonia's page says the walk starts. Villers-la-Ville station (SNCB) is about 1 km from the car park as the crow flies, about 1.4 km on foot.

Route drawn by Global Adventurer along OpenStreetMap paths (© OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL), with figures worked out from it. Check the forecast and the ground on the day: paths change.