Good areas near Grand Place?

What are the good neighbourhoods near the Grand Place and where should I avoid and what direction are they in (north, east, south, west)?

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Good for what, exactly? No hotel that is near the Grand%26#39; Place/Sentral Station can be said to be in a %26quot;bad%26quot; area.

The crime hot spots in Brussels are the 2 poorest communes, Molenbeek (which is across the canal) and St. Josse (outside the inner ring, downhill from Madou), and there is a petty crime problem in and around the Gare du Midi but no area of Brussels 1000 is especially unsafe unless you count the daylight robbery of the Ilôt Sacré tourist trap restaurants.

This is not to say you can%26#39;t be pickpocketed anywhere in town if you don%26#39;t watch yourself, especially anywhere there are crowds (metro, Mannekin Pis..), but I%26#39;m sure the same applies to London.

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We basically want to be really close to the Grand Place in somewhere that looks picturesque. Any thoughts

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Agree w previous post. For more upscale hotels, lots of friends happy with Hotel Amigo, which a larger hotel a few steps from GP. www.hotelamigo.com

or try

Le Meridien Brussels

Carrefour de L%26#39;Europe 3

1000 Brussels (Center), Belgium

+32 2 548 42 11

both steps away from Grand Place

Good luck!

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I suppose the GP itself counts as picturesque, there is only one hotel in it, which is the St. Michel, but you have the Amigo - supposedly top hotel in Brussels - just behind the Town Hall (side going towards Gare du Midi so South, in theory). People here do not give directions here in terms of N, S, E, W as they do in London (we have an upper and lower town and then navigate according to nearby monuments/areas), but on the side of the GP towards Gare du Nord (so presumably North) you have the rue du Marché aux Herbes and the Ilôt Sacré restaurant area, with hotels: Arlequin, Alma, Aris Grand%26#39; Place etc.

On this basis the Gare centrale would be East, and there are dozens of hotels between there and the GP, from the Méridien to the Novotel Grand%26#39; Place, a nice one is the Dixseptième, a small one the Madeleine.

On the other side of the GP, so West, you have the Bourse (stock exchange), which is somewhat less convenient for the Gare centrale, here you have the Marriott and various others (see recent questions about hotels near Winter Market). But I am not sure whether you would call it picturesque.

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