Streek-GR Kempen West

The Streek-GR Kempen is a loop of roughly 246 kilometres through the Antwerp Kempen, waymarked with yellow and red stripes and published by Grote Routepaden. This route runs from Hoogstraten in the north via Rijkevorsel and Westmalle to Zoersel, 49 kilometres in three stages.

The first day starts at the begijnhof of Hoogstraten and walks into the Wortel colony, one of the seven Colonies of Benevolence and a World Heritage Site since 2021: avenues on a tight grid, farmsteads and woods that belong together. It then continues through woods and meadows to Rijkevorsel.

The second day crosses the woods and heath fragments between Rijkevorsel and Westmalle, with the Trappist abbey of Westmalle about a kilometre off the route. The third runs through woods to Zoersel, where the Zoerselbos with its hay meadows and old oaks shapes the last kilometres.

The landscape is gentle: pine woods, meadows, hedgerows and the occasional fen. There is little elevation, the paths are mostly sand or grass and soft after rain.

Practical. The route is waymarked with yellow and red stripes, and white and red where it runs with another GR. Hoogstraten and Zoersel have no station: you arrive by bus from Antwerp or Turnhout, and the begijnhof is a few hundred metres from the stops. The stages end in Rijkevorsel and near Westmalle, where there is a bed and breakfast and rooms at a brasserie. Spring and late summer are the best months; the heather flowers in August.