Namur

22/05/2009

It’s time to leave Paris, too soon, but we will never forget this wonderful city and will remember these three days for the rest of our lives. We made some wonderful memories, and hopefully we will be able to come back to Paris in a few years and explore a lot more of the city.

After much deliberation we decided to skip Brussels, we only saw a small part as we rushed from the one train station to the other. We felt like it’s time to get out of the hustle and bustle of a big city, and since we didn’t go to La Proviance, we headed for Namur.

Namur is a gem of a town, we actually had no idea what to expect, and were pleasantly surprised. We actually wanted to visit the Ardennes forest, but was so captivated by the little town (and a little pressed for time) that we spent most of our time sight seeing in the town.

We stayed in the only Casino in Namur. It was being revamped from the lower levels upwards, and being on the 3rd floor they’ve not gotten to our rooms

On the Thalys to Belgium

as yet. The room is spacious and well kept; even if you can see the bathroom is a bit old. The place is spotless and is probably the “coldest” of all the places we stayed so far. We can’t complain, so we won’t.

As we walked into town we discovered a smallish festival, everyone is dressed in a medieval theme and there are jesters and even a few witches! At first we thought it’s just goths as the people dressed similar to the people that goes to Zeplins night club at home, but we soon realized this is not everyday wear.

Poor Leon was starving by this time and with all the complaining his tummy is doing we decided to rather skip the festivities and search for a nice cheap place to eat. Up to now we only saw some really expensive restaurants and we were a bit worried as not only do they charge an arm and a leg for a basic dish, but in Namur french is almost the only spoken language, much more so than Paris, and even thou we know a few words by this time we knew that we would struggle a bit

Ginormous flowers

Outside Brussels train station

more than in France where people are a bit more used to tourists.

We picked our place to eat by the prices on the menu in the window. As this was a Taiwanese Restaurant and we did not understand anything but pork & chicken, we decided to do this Fear Factor style (just order anything and hope for the best)!
We ended up having the best food we had on this whole trip so far! We stuffed down a huge amount of beef and chicken and with the help of the waitress we had a desert of Vanilla flavored ice-cream, cream & chocolate sauce. We just have to bring to your attention that vanilla here does not mean boring white ice-cream, it actually smells and tastes like vanilla! The flavor is amazing! When ever find yourself in Namur please visit the Asian Garden restaurant. After ordering we also noticed that there is an English menu and we were relieved that we didn’t end up with a plate of frog legs! We had a nice beer named Jupiler, even Melinda is by now starting to realize that all beer is not just a bitter brew, but there are slight differences

Namur Carnival

It's nice but you don't understand a thing thats being said.

in the tastes of the beers. She admits that she’ll never be a beer drinker, but the new experience is quite acceptable, and the best part is that every beer has its own special glass and it’s getting easy to decide which beer to order, the one with the nicest glass of course…

After our delicious meal Leon was satisfied and we found our way joking and laughing back to the Hotel. We felt rejuvenated and after a nice warm bath Melinda went to bed, Leon was long gone and already sleeping like a baby.

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