Belgium

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Travel blog 3
Belgium has been a whirlwind filled with frites, bikes, waffles and beer... that sounds like a recipe for excellence. We arrived to Bruges after a pretty grueling train day. It was an 11 hour train ride- which was a bit longer than expected because a train we were supposed to go on caught on fire so we had to take a local train the last leg of our trip, which seemed to stop in every farm town on in the belgian countryside. Regardless we made it to Bruge with the sun still shining (because it doesn't set until about 10:30 here!) and settled into our hostel. The trip put me into a semi grumpy mood but it was nothing that couldn't be remedied with a belgian beer tasting at our hostel bar, which Rosie and I indulged ourselves in for a very reasonable price. We then headed to bed because we only had one day to see Bruge and we wanted to enjoy it. The north of Belgium, like the netherlands loves their bikes. We thought that would be the best way to see the city- so we rented two bikes from our hostel for 6 euro a piece and set off around the town. Bruges is a great place to bike, as soon as you get over the bumpiness of the cobblestones, which my butt did not appreciate. We rode around for a bit to get our bearings then headed to the famous crooked bell tower. We walked up the stairs to the top. Although it was high up, by now we are pros of stairs, but it did get very, very narrow. At one point I got very close with an older British gentlemen while we were passing each other on the stairs. Private parts may or may not have touched, but we both moved along quick enough for it not to be awkward. At the top it was quite the site to see. Bruges is an amazing, picturesque little city, and mixed with the wonderful locals, and perfect weather we had, it has found a special place in my heart. After the bell tower we headed to the oldest brewery in Bruges and hopped on a tour. To our delight, we realized on the tour that this was the brewery that they made our favorite beer from the previous night's tasting at the hostel. Our tour guide may be one of my favorite people we have met in Europe (second only to the Italian women that we met on the train... See my first post). She loved her job, loved the brewery, and most of all loved beer. My favorite quote of the tour was her final parting words "they don't have beer in heaven, so that is why we have to drink it here". After the tour we were starving, so we grabbed some lunch, where we had the infamous frites. For those of you who don't know, fries were created in Belgium, and since fries are my weakness, we felt like we needed to indulge. After lunch we went to one of the many churches in Bruges to see Michelangelo's Madonna and Child statue. It was much smaller then it looked on the slides from my art history class at the castle, but beautiful none the less. After riding around on our bikes for a little while longer, we picked up our backpacks from the hostel and headed over to the train station to go to Brussels.
Brussels is ugly. That's what the locals say about it and I couldn't agree more. Although for the most part the city is pretty gritty, there are some places- especially in the old part of town that will take your breath away. Now- we had been to Brussels before, and we had a great time, but we felt like there was a lot of the city we missed. I'm pretty sure that any lose ends from the last trip we tied up today. After arriving from Bruges, we settled into our hostel, and went to get dinner at an amazing falafel place, which was recommended in our "locals" map. We both felt a little sketched out to go to the major bar area alone. We remembered from our last trip that it could get a little seedy around there at night, and we were nervous to take the subway back too late. Instead we jut went to another recommended bar near where we got our dinner, sat there for a couple hours, nursed two beers (like true Belgians) and talked about our trip, moving, college being over, our families and more. It was a really nice night, and what my brain needed.
Thus morning we headed out to explore the city. We started at an awesome flea market that happens every day in the south-west corner of the city. There is something so cool about other people's junk, and it makes it cooler when it is European junk. We rummaged and walked around, and then left. Most of the day was spent walking around the city. Any museum or interest we saw our first time around- so we went over to the main square (which we almost missed all together the first time we were here) ate waffles, drank fruity beer and took in the ugliness of the city. To end our day in Brussels we were going to go on a self guided walking tour of the northern part of the city, which would eventually put us on the path to our hostel to pick up our bags. The first stop on the tour was pretty cool- the botanical gardens, which is confusing and maze-like to navigate, but interesting to see. As we were walking to our next stop, along the streets that the map told us to go on, we realized, partly due to the women with heavy make up, and partly due to the red lights in some of the windows, that we had made it to the Brussels red light district (or more like street). We were here without warning from our map, and unlike Amsterdam's red-light district, this place did not feel too safe. So we abandoned the walking tour and just headed back to the hostel, where we caught up on some emails and chatted with Kirin. Now we're en route to the airport to head on a flight to Edinburgh. I'm super excited for our week in the UK. I also can't believe that we have been traveling for two weeks. We've seen so much, but it has also flown by. Rosie has been a great travel partner, which has made this trip extremely less stressful, and the most fun. Well time to fly! Until next time! 

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