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Right at the heart of mining country, 35km south of Lille, and badly damaged in both world wars,
DOUAI
is a surprisingly attractive and lively town, its streets of eighteenth-century houses cut through by both river and canal. Once a haven for English Catholics fleeing Protestant oppression in Tudor England, Douai later became the seat of Flemish local government under Louis XIV, an aristocratic past evoked in the novels of Balzac.
Centre of activity is the
place d'Armes
, overlooked by the massive Gothic belfry of the
HEtel de Ville
on rue de la Mairie, popularized by Victor Hugo and renowned for its carillon of 62 bells - the largest single collection of bells in Europe. It rings every 15 minutes, and there are hour-long concerts every Saturday at 10.45am, on public holidays at 11am, and in summer on Monday at 9pm (hourly guided tours: July & Aug daily 10-11am & 2-5pm; rest of year Mon-Sat 2-5pm, Sun 10am, 11am, 3pm & 5pm; 11F/eŽ1.68).
One block north of the town hall, on
rue Bellegambe
, is an outrageous Art Nouveau shop-front serving a very ordinary haberdashery store. At the end of the street, rising above the old town, are the Baroque dome and tower of the
church of St-Pierre
, an immense, mainly eighteenth-century church with - among other treasures - a spectacular carved Baroque organ case. East of the place d'Armes, Douai's oldest church, the twelfth-century
church of Notre-Dame
, suffered badly in the last war but has been refreshingly modernized inside. Beyond the church is the better of the town's two surviving medieval gateways, the
Porte Valenciennes
, now the centre of a triumphal roundabout. With the exception of the 1970s extension to the old Flemish Parliament building, the riverfront west of the town hall is pleasant to wander along. Between the river and the canal to the west, on rue de Chartreux, the
Ancienne Chartreuse
has been converted into a museum (Mon & Wed-Sat 10am-noon & 2-5pm, Sun 3-6pm; 12F/eŽ1.83), with a good collection of paintings by Flemish, Dutch and French masters, including Van Dyck, Rubens, Rodin and Douai's own Jean Bellegambe.
The
gare SNCF
is a five-minute walk from place d'Armes - from the station head left down avenue Marechal Leclerc, then right onto the place d'Armes. The
tourist office
(July & Aug daily 9am-noon & 2-6pm; rest of year closed Sun; tel 03.27.88.26.79, fax 03.27.99.38.78) is within the fifteenth-century HEtel du Dauphin, on the square. For
accommodation
there's the
HEtel au Grand Balcon
, on place Carnot (tel 03.27.88.91.07; 160-220F/eŽ24-34), or the better
Grand Cerf
, 46 rue St-Jacques (tel 03.27.88.79.60, fax 03.27.98.05.74; 300-400F/eŽ46-61). A far classier option is
La Terrasse
, a swanky four-star in the narrow terrasse St-Pierre (tel 03.27.88.70.04, fax 03.27.88.36.05; 400-500F/eŽ61-76), to one side of the church of St-Pierre; its restaurant is well regarded, with menus from 145F/eŽ22.11.
Just northeast of the place d'Armes is the
post office
, whence buses leave for Lewarde (Line #1 orange).
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