Spanning 92 acres, the Morris Arboretum & Gardens is a living museum dedicated to promoting education and community engagement through horticulture. With over 12,000 labeled trees, plants, and flowers, it offers an immersive botanical experience. Visitors can enjoy guided tours during the spring and fall, deepening their appreciation for the diverse plant life. One of the highlights is the Tree Adventure exhibit and its canopy walk, which provides a unique and exciting perspective of the surrounding flora, fostering a deeper connection to the natural world.

The beguinages of Flanders and the Netherlands are always oases of calm and stillness, where you might still expect to see an old beguine mumbling her prayers in a doorway. Two of Ghent’s three beguinages have been included on the UNESCO World Heritage list. Although the Old St Elizabeth Beguinage, in Begijnhofdries in Ghent, is no longer enclosed by a wall, making it simply part of the city, it still has a unique atmosphere. Today the Old St Elizabeth Beguinage is known as ‘holy corner’, a place of religious tolerance, because it has no less than three different churches: one is Roman Catholic, one is Orthodox and the other is Protestant. From bleachfield to orchard This open beguinage grew into something of a ‘beguine city’ in the 13th century, with a church, the ‘Grootjuffer’s House’, an infirmary, a chapel, more than a hundred houses for beguines, a bleachfield (a field where linen was laid out to bleach) and an orchard. After the French Revolution, with increasing industrialisation, the inhabitants moved to their new beguinage in Sint-Amandsberg in 1873.

Aristotelous Square is the most impressive square in Thessaloniki. It features buildings with monumental architecture inspired by European and colonial models, cafes, shops and restaurants. It is the focal point in big celebrations, such as the coming of the New Year, and is the de facto meeting place during the day. The history of Aristotelous Square began with the Great Fire of 1917 that destroyed two thirds of the city. The French architect Ernest Hébrard designed Aristotelous Square to serve as an end of a monumental axis for Thessaloniki that would stretch from the seafront to Dikastirion Square and the Roman Forum. The final design, built in the 1950s, is a lot more stripped down than Hébrard's original proposal, but still has significant architectural value.

Located in the same property as the Turkish Consulate in Thessaloniki, the Atatürk Museum is the birthplace of the founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, 'Father of the Turks', who was born here in 1881. It is a three-storey house with a courtyard, and its original furniture. Any missing items were replaced with items from Kemal's mausoleum and from Topkapi Palace in Istanbul. Naturally, the museum is very popular with visitors from Turkey. A replica of the house has been constructed in Ankara.