Why Ghent needs a local guide
Ghent has the medieval architecture without the tourist swarm. The Graslei waterfront is as pretty as anything in Bruges but with actual locals drinking on it. The city has the largest car-free zone in Belgium. The student population — 70,000 of them — keeps the nightlife going seven days a week. Patershol is a tangle of medieval streets full of restaurants that aren't trying to impress anyone.
Ghent sees around 3 million visitors a year, and the number is climbing fast as word spreads that this city has everything Bruges has but with a pulse. The Graslei waterfront on a summer evening is packed with students and locals, not tour groups. The Patershol neighborhood is a maze of medieval alleys where the restaurants serve waterzooi and stoofvlees without a tourist markup. To become a tour guide in Ghent means understanding a university city that also happens to be one of the most beautiful in Europe. The 70,000 students keep prices honest and the bars open seven nights a week. The Gentse Feesten in July is ten days of free festivals that turn the entire city into an open-air party — it is the largest cultural festival in Europe and barely known outside Belgium. To become a tour guide in Ghent is to know the cuberdon vendors on the Groentenmarkt and the decades-long feud between them, the vegetarian restaurant scene that makes Ghent one of the most veg-friendly cities in the world, and the Dampoort neighborhood where the artists moved when the centre got too polished. Become a tour guide in Ghent and you sell a city that is ready to break through.