Nijmegen

Nijmegen was Ulpia Noviomagus, a Roman town that received market rights around AD 100, which gives it the standing claim to be the oldest city in the Netherlands. Charlemagne had a palace on the Valkhof hill above the river and the sixteenth-century remains include a small sixteenth-century chapel and the Sint-Nicolaaskapel, a sixteen-sided building of about 1030 modelled on Aachen. The centre was destroyed by an accidental American bombing raid in February 1944 and then fought over, so much of it is postwar. What is new is the river: between 2012 and 2016 the Waal dyke at Lent was moved several hundred metres back and a secondary channel dug, creating an island and a park in the middle of the city as part of the national Room for the River programme - a large, visible piece of a policy shift away from raising dykes. It has become the city's main public space.

What you actually see

• A Roman foundation - market rights around AD 100, the oldest city claim.
• The Valkhof - Charlemagne's palace hill with a sixteen-sided chapel of about 1030.
• A new river channel - the Waal given a second course and an island through the city.
• A postwar centre - rebuilt after the 1944 bombing and the fighting that followed.

When to go

April to October; July for the Vierdaagse walking event. Two days.

Honest expectations

Much of the centre is postwar rebuilding. The Vierdaagse in July fills the city completely for a week. Museums close on Mondays. The river park floods in high water, by design.

Nearby

Millingerwaard is east; Arnhem is north.