Though most of us eat copious quantities of fish, how often do we think of the arduous and often dangerous work needed to gather them in from the high seas? From the towns of Nieuwpoort (adjoining Oostduinkerke to the east), Ostend and Zeebrugge on the Belgian coast, large Belgian fishing fleets depart each day on trips ranging from two days (from Nieuwpoort) to two weeks (from Ostend and Zeebrugge), and to fishing areas as far as Iceland. This museum—the National Visserijmuseum, in a small park just behind the Town Hall (center of Oostduinkerke)—tells their story and their history over the past several hundred years. Many never return, and as you enter the grounds, you pass memorial stones bearing the names of hundreds of Flemish fishermen lost at sea, some as recently as the 1970s. "lis ont offert leur jeune vie a la mer" (they have offered their young lives to the sea), says an engraved inscription. "Seul, leurs noms sont testes. lis resteront pour toujours graves dans ces pierres" (Only their names have survived. They will survive forever, engraved on these stones).

Inside the museum are instructive maps of where the fleets go to provide fish for the restaurant tables of Brussels and elsewhere; remarkable models (made by the curator) of the ships they use and have used; celebrated paintings of fishermen (including the horse-fishermen) and of the sea itself (the latter by Louis Artan, an artist of high rank, after whom the city's leading hotel was named), old fashioned photos of them, all manner of fishing implements, and too many other items to name. Part of the museum complex is a reconstructed, typical fishermen's house of the area, with its furnishings of the late 1800s, this one the "fermette" of a horse-fisherman who gathered shrimp at low tide, then used the same horse in the fields for ploughing, all in between expeditions by boat. Outside are actual wooden fishing boats, their large paddles used for casting nets. The Fishing Museum, only one of its kind in Belgium, is a delightfully modern, one-story building with floor-to-ceiling windows (on one side) that create a sparkling atmosphere for your visit. And your visit, if you're a traveller open to new ideas and subject matter, will be a memorable one.