Lille

The Grand Place, Vieux-Lille and La Piscine in Roubaix

Lille fills two days. Start on the Grand Place and in the Vieille Bourse courtyard, climb the 104-metre belfry of the Hôtel de Ville, then walk Vieux-Lille to the Hospice Comtesse and the Citadelle. On day two, take Metro line 2 to La Piscine in Roubaix and come back for the Palais des Beaux-Arts.

Start on the Grand Place, under the Grande Déesse on her column, and step into the courtyard of the Vieille Bourse, where second-hand booksellers set out their stalls and older men play chess under the arcades. Walk east to the Hôtel de Ville and climb its belfry, a UNESCO-listed tower 104 metres high, for the view over the brick roofs towards Belgium.

After lunch, wander north into Vieux-Lille. Rue de la Monnaie leads past boutiques in 17th-century houses to the Hospice Comtesse, an old hospital that is now a museum of Flemish interiors. Stop at Meert on Rue Esquermoise for a vanilla waffle, then carry on to the star-shaped Citadelle and the park around it if the light holds. Eat dinner in an estaminet.

On the second morning, take Metro line 2 to Roubaix for La Piscine, where sculpture and painting line a converted Art Deco swimming pool. Be back by mid-afternoon for the Palais des Beaux-Arts on Place de la République, with its Rubens and Goya canvases and the basement hall of scale models of fortified towns. If it is Sunday, swap the order and start early at Wazemmes market.

Carbonnade, potjevleesch and the welsh in Lille

Lille's food is Flemish and is best eaten in an estaminet, a low-ceilinged tavern; Vieux-Lille has the most. Order carbonnade flamande (beef in brown beer), potjevleesch (a cold meat terrine with chips) or a welsh (ham and toast under melted cheddar). Meert on Rue Esquermoise sells the city's vanilla waffles.

The food of French Flanders is built for grey weather, and the estaminet is where to eat it: a low-ceilinged tavern with wooden tables, old enamel signs and a blackboard menu. Vieux-Lille has the highest concentration of them.

Carbonnade flamande is beef stewed slowly in brown beer with onions and a slice of gingerbread spread with mustard, which thickens and sweetens the sauce. Potjevleesch is a cold terrine of several white meats, usually chicken, rabbit and pork, set in jelly and served with chips. The welsh, borrowed from across the Channel, is toast and ham drowned in cheddar melted with beer and often crowned with a fried egg; it is a full meal.

Maroilles, a pungent washed-rind cheese from the region, turns up baked in tarts and melted into sauces, and moules-frites are on almost every menu. Beer is the default drink, with Belgian ales poured as readily as French ones. For something sweet, buy Meert's thin waffles filled with Madagascar vanilla, sold from the same shop since the 18th century, and try a slice of tarte au sucre, a brioche tart glazed with brown sugar, from any bakery.

The Braderie in September, Christmas in Lille and trips out

Lille is most comfortable from May to September, with highs around 24C in July and August, though rain falls all year. The Braderie de Lille on the first weekend of September is the biggest event, and a Christmas market fills Place Rihour in December. The Louvre-Lens is about 40 minutes by train.

The weather is the price of a trip north. January averages 7C by day and 2C at night, and rain is spread through the year, peaking at about 75 mm in November. July and August are mild at around 24C, which makes May to September the comfortable months for the Citadelle park and café terraces, but pack a rain jacket whatever the season.

The Braderie de Lille, on the first weekend of September, is the biggest event of the year: a flea market that takes over the centre day and night, with restaurants piling empty mussel shells outside to show how many portions they sold. Cars are kept out, trains arrive packed and rooms are booked months ahead. In late November and December a Christmas market fills Place Rihour, and a big wheel turns on the Grand Place.

Day trips are easy by train. The Louvre-Lens, a branch of the Paris Louvre in a former mining town, is about 40 minutes away and lays out several thousand years of art in one long gallery. LaM in Villeneuve-d'Ascq, at the end of a short bus ride from Metro line 1, holds modern and outsider art in a sculpture park. Belgian cities are close too: Brussels is little more than half an hour by high-speed train.