The Volkegemberg is the main street of Volkegem, a village of Oudenaarde, lifting out of a small valley into a centre that has been a protected village site since 1981: narrow and winding, framed by farmsteads, limited to 30 km/h over much of its length because of the primary school. The whole hill was cobbled until 1982 and it is asphalt now, with 200 metres of big modern setts left near the top, so the rough part comes at the end rather than the bottom. Nothing about it is savage, roughly 5% over the full kilometre with a steepest pitch near 12%, and the gradient gives up at the modest Sint-Martinuskerk and its enclosed churchyard on the summit, 84 metres. There is no summit sign, but Den Obus is up there, one of the last authentic village cafés in the Flemish Ardennes, named for a shell that landed here in the First World War, terrace out front, shut Tuesdays and Wednesdays. The Ronde van Vlaanderen used it 17 times between 1974 and 1996 and the Omloop Het Volk often had its race decided on it; today the Ronde descends it instead and turns right at the foot onto the Wolvenberg, while Dwars door Vlaanderen has opened its climbing here, in 2023 and again in 2026.