Lillo Travel Guide

There are a couple of pubs in Lillo. During the week, most of the time, these pubs are occupied by people who work in the chemical plants around Lillo and just want a drink with colleagues after work . During the weekends, it are the tourists.

"'t Pleintje" and "Lindelo" are those I visit the most.

Dress Code: Casual

As Lillo is lying in the middle of the petrochemical harbour, there are no trains or busses to this place. You can only reach it by car. There is a big parking lot at the entrance of the town.

From Antwerp, take highway A12 towards Bergen Op Zoom/Rotterdam (NL). When you have passed exit Kapellen/Ekeren, you need to follow the sign towards Gent/Tol. After driving through the Tijsmanstunnel take the first exit no. 12 and follow the signs to Lillo.

Lillo is just past the mill on your left. You will only see the trees from the big road.

Recently they started to keep sheep here again. On the picture you can see them gathering together high and dry to catch the first sun of today.

But once in a day they are left running lose through the fields below when the river is at low tide. Those fields are under water when it is high tide. The river Schelde has a difference of quite some meters between low and high tide and when the last happens, it is actually the high tide of the sea (Northsea) that pushes up the salt water into the river and this salt water mixes with the sweet one and creates a very interesting habitat for certain plants and breeding birds, but also for our sheeps.

They say that the kind of gras they eat there is special one that is a bit salty and that you can taste it in the meat. I cannot tell you if this is true, these pré-salé cattle is rather expensive, so not accordingly to my budget.

Today, in Spring, you could see many lamb amongst them. Now I was sad I only brought my little camera and not the bigger one. With this one I cannot zoom properly and somehow when I tried to come closer, one sheep was suspicious and started to run and then the whole group started to run... I guess that is sheepish eh? :)

Be aware that the harbour and chemical factories are just around the corner. It can be possible that you will hear a lot of noise and sometimes there are odours from the factories.

When walking in the nature resort nearby (with a guide), my colleague asked me if I wanted to take a picture of her in front of this reed.
The guide overheared her request and warned her not to go there. We looked suprise... why ?

He stepped in the mud with boots and then he stired up the mud...

" Now open your nose" he said...

we all smell oil...

"yes it is oil" he said... and then continued his story...

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Several years ago on this same spot, someone discovered each time at low tide, a remarkable amount of oil coming towards the surface. Each time the water came up at high tide, the oil was washed away.

First people thought of a leak in one of the pipelines of the surrounding factories. They were all contacted and urged to make a very close check-up. Nothing however was found, no leak in their pipelines. Even better, no one had an oil pipeline!

Strange, really weird as the oil came still to the surface day after day. Eventually the city decided that we might have to dig into the ground and check what was happening. Some newspapers blocked "Antwerp drilling for oil!"and were already speculating what we would do if we would find an oil field underground!

As soon as this news became public, the city council got an urgent call from the NATO. It seemed it was their secret line that was leaking there. It is a huge pipeline pushing oil in high pressure from the Netherlands towards France.
If they knew it was leaking ?... euhmmm well... They didn't say they would restore it, it was not so important. Yet a while later it seemed less oil was coming out and lesser...
The secret pipeline got secretly restored???

But sad enough recently it started to leak again. All wonder if NATO will take their responsability against the environment and repair it again, public or secret? Fact is that it is poluting the soil of this natural protected domain.

Such an official institution should at least give a good example. I think this is really shameful!