A Belgian beery holiday

What wine is to the French, beer is to the Belgians, making the country one of the world's top places to go for a holiday sampling the local brews.

With 450 different beers made in the Flanders region alone, and Belgium managing to export a billion litres of the drink every year to the rest of world, the country is something of a beer connoisseur's paradise.

And it is not just the brewing giants such as InBev (formerly Interbrew), which produces Stella Artois, Becks, Leffe and Hoegaarden among many others, that you can try out with a holiday in the Flanders region.

The regular beer festivals bring together small and large breweries alike, from pubs that create their own beer in micro-breweries to multinationals, all keen to let visitors sample their tasty produce.

One of the easiest of these to get to is Brussels Beer Weekend, taking place from August 31st to September 2nd 2007, now in its night year.

The city's Grand Place will be home to 44 different Belgian breweries for the weekend, and entrance to the festival is free.

The event opens by paying homage to the patron saint of brewing (Saint-Arnold), and along with the beers themselves, holidaymakers will get a chance to see a procession with traditional brewery carts and wagons running through the streets of Brussels, at 13:00 on the Saturday.

Beers can be bought using the event's special coins, which cost €3 for four coins, with most of the drinks costing two or three coins.

You can then glance down your beer card, which lists all the beers and their prices, to choose what to try next of the 330 or so available at the festival.

Alternatively, the West Flanders region of Belgium also has its own version of the legendary Oktoberfest that takes place in Munich in Germany, in the city of Diksmuide.

The October Beer Festival has being going for more than 40 years, and features music, dancing and beer drinking.

The event runs from October 20th to 27th 2007 and admission costs €3, with beers priced at either €1.30 or €1.80.

For more information on visiting the Flanders region of Belgium see www.visitflanders.co.uk