Le Grand Tour

The legend of ‘Notre-Dame de Walcourt’ tells that, during a fire in 1218, the statue was carried by angels to the other side of the valley, to a tree in the hamlet known as the ‘little garden’. Despite several attempts to return it to the basilica, it was only possible when Thierry II, the Count of Rochefort and Lord of Walcourt, promised to build an abbey in honour of Our Lady, where the angels had left it. Since the Middle Ages, pilgrims have followed the route taken by the statue. It allows you to discover more than 40 chapels, ‘potales’, cavalries and sanctuaries. The highlight is Holy Trinity Day, when a solemn procession commemorates the ‘Miracle of the Garden’, accompanied by armed marchers from the Entre-Sambre-et-Meuse region.