When I was younger—already in high school, technically an adult but still with a childlike obsession—my single true passion in life was supercars. Every day, without fail, I logged onto a Dutch website where fellow car spotters uploaded pictures of the exotic cars they had seen on the streets. Social media hadn’t yet taken over the world; back then, this site and YouTube were the holy grail for anyone like me.
Because the site was based in the Netherlands, most of the sightings came from the Benelux countries. Again and again, one name appeared beneath pictures of Ferraris, Lamborghinis, and Porsches: Knokke-Heist. To me, it became a mythical place. If so many supercars roamed its streets, surely there had to be something extraordinary about this coastal town.
My best friend at the time, who had lived in Belgium, poured cold water on my dreams. He’d been to Knokke-Heist a few times and dismissed it as nothing more than a posh hangout for the wealthy, without much real substance. Still, in my imagination, it remained something special—a destination worth one day reaching.
Fast forward many years. A friend, not the same one, and I found ourselves on a road trip. Earlier in the day, we had wandered along the vast sands of De Panne, Belgium’s southernmost beach town, where at low tide the shoreline recedes up to 500 meters, leaving an almost endless stretch of sand between the seawall and the sea. In my mind, that had to be the crown jewel of Belgium’s coast.
Our plan for the rest of the day was simple: head towards Eindhoven in the Netherlands for the night, but not before crossing one more curiosity off my list—the westernmost point of the Netherlands. It was only a short detour, nothing dramatic, and I had already scoped it out on Google Street View. It hadn’t looked like much, just a lonely border spot between Belgium and the Netherlands.
As Waze guided us north, roadside signs began to whisper another name: Knokke-Heist. My pulse jumped a little. Near Sint Anna ter Muiden, we crossed into the municipality itself. By pure accident, I had arrived at the edge of the place I once dreamed of visiting. But I was older now, focused on chasing geographical extremities, not luxury cars. Driving into Knokke-Heist itself never even crossed my mind.
We soon crossed into the Netherlands. In true Schengen fashion, there were no border checks—only a subtle change in the road signs and architecture. We parked behind a gas station on the Dutch side and walked toward the border corner itself. The first thing I noticed was unsettling: a charred ruin of a building on the Belgian side. Later, curiosity got the better of me and I learned that it had been Brasserie Livingroom 102, destroyed the previous November when a fire broke out while batteries were charging. The site was now for sale—for nearly €600,000.
This particular border spot is unusual. The frontier makes a sharp 90-degree turn here, forming a neat corner. One Belgian house sits so close to the line that the border literally cuts across a corner of the building. Depending on whether you check the satellite or map view on Google, the westernmost point of the Netherlands seems either inside the house or just outside, on the pavement. In reality, the official border marker stands right beside it.
The house itself didn’t seem residential—it looked commercial, which was lucky for awkward tourists like me. And then came the twist: the building housed the Zoute Grand Prix Club, an organizer of exotic car rallies. Even here, on a detour about geography rather than horsepower, I couldn’t quite escape my past.
My friend, understandably, wasn’t impressed. Apart from a half-hidden church tower visible from the gas station, there wasn’t much to see. We returned to the motorway, letting Waze drag us back toward Antwerp. Yet the past had one more card to play. On the highway, two Aston Martins glided past us, unmistakably heading toward Knokke-Heist.
I smiled. Years ago, I might have turned the car around and chased them into town. But that evening, a little older and a little wiser, I let them go—and we made it to Eindhoven in time for a late dinner.