Valkhof Park occupies the prominent hill above the Waal that made Nijmegen strategically important for two thousand years. The Romans built a fortress here, the Franks built a palace, and the medieval emperors built chapels. Today the park is a peaceful public space, but the ruins embedded in it are remarkable: the apse of the Barbara Chapel, a curved fragment of Romanesque stonework from the 1100s, survives alongside the much better-preserved octagonal Saint Nicholas Chapel, which still has its full walls and dome and can be visited.
The park also has a viewing terrace over the Waal with one of the best perspectives on the wide river plain and the Waalbrug below. In summer the terraces of the nearby Valkhof Museum spill out onto the park's edge. The whole hilltop takes about an hour to explore properly — the chapels, the excavated Roman foundations, and the views together make it the most historically layered spot in the city.