Lac de Gileppe

When you have absolutely nothing on your agenda, it becomes attractive to visit things that you have driven by in the past 10 years.  And so we drove out to visit the 4th power dam lake in the area of East Belgium, the only one we had not visited yet.

We have often been at the Lac de Robertville, also multiple times the power dam lakes of Eupen and Butgenbach...but never the oldest and probably most well-known lake of the Gileppe dam.

The dam was the oldest concrete dam in Europe, constructed and opened in 1878. A giant sculpture of a lion of 13,5 meters decorates the dam... looking proudly to the nearby German border and the former Prussian empire. 

Nowadays the area is quite peaceful. You can stroll over the 300 long dam which has a wide promenade.  There's nearby interpretative trails of multiple distances so you are not obliged to start hiking around the 14 km lake as I had thought.   There is a small playground , a bistro in the summer, a belvedere tower that looks out from the parking lot.  And there is a panorama tower where a glass elevator takes you to a panoramic view for free. One floor up (with stairs) there is a small restaurant where we had a meal.

It's a nice place to visit and see some industrial heritage which is still an important actual (and renewed in the 70ies) power and water supply. 

in the Belvedere