We arrived in Brussels on a chilly Thursday evening, it was very quiet and almost quaint in comparison to our morning in touristy Nice. This was the view from our hotel room!
Not really sure where to go, we wandered the quiet streets, hoping to find something chocolate or beer related. We easily stumbled onto Grand Palace; It was really beautiful just as the city lights were turning on!
Yummmm, this is making me feel like...
Waffles with chocolate! As we were chomping this down, an important looking French motorcade flanked by stacks of police zoomed down the alley where we were eating waffles. Grace thinks she saw Nicholas Sarkosy in the car!
To further indulge, these artery-clogging double-fried frites covered in mayo are amazing. You really start to worry if all you are eating are these, waffles, and Belgium beer.
But when the beer is this tasty you can't refuse. We stopped into a place called Beer Mania to try some of the advertised 400 different types of beer.
Tin-tin wall!
There was some great Art Nouveau architecture... this is the museum of musical instruments
Galeries St-Hubert, one of the first shopping arcades in the world
Somewhat underwhelming was the European Parliament; it was Friday arvo and I guess everyone knocked off early, it was really quiet and we couldn't get in anywhere.
Somewhat amusing is that all the signs are in every European language
We don't really know what this was but I hugged it anyway.
From quiet Brussels we continued on to quiet Bruges, not really knowing much more about it than the fact there is a movie called 'In Bruges' which neither of us had seen. There is a lot of gingerbread-like medieval architecture - Bruges was touristy but still peaceful.
There were some windmill topped grassy hills nearby, where we sat and chilled out for a while- it was quite hot which was unusual for Belgium weather.
Grace would make a great windmill!
We decided to do the touristy thing and jumped on a canal cruise. It wasn't greatly informative but a good way to get off your feet and see the city from a different angle.
This dog was dozing on the window as we cruised by
A side canal where the swans hung out, out of the tourist boat traffic
There were a bunch of people 'fishing' tourists from the bridge with candy dangling on lines. I like to think it was a scam, even though its probably just some kids having fun. Still I wouldn't be surprised!
At the Basilica of the Holy Blood, we saw what was a container which contains another container which might contain the congealed blood of Jesus Christ. The whole thing is a little creepy if you ask me. It's been in Bruges for a long time (since 12th century), and while it isn't known if it is genuine, they still celebrate it and its arrival to the city so long ago. Disappointing that there wasn't a large red vial on display!
Statues eating other statues?! Heaps of the sculpture around had a kind of quirky theme to it.
I liked this tower, all overgrown with vines and shrubs.
No comments:
Post a Comment