We are both excited to be leaving Calais - M navigates us into Belgium and on up to Bruges - 116 km Bruges is a canal based city - the Venice of the North - a medieval town virtually untouched - surrounded by gingerbread houses, cobbled alleys (creating a maze of one way streets) giant white swans and many varieties of ducks. Bruges was occupied in both WW I and WW II but neither the Allied nor German armies had the heart to raze it. In WW II German commander Imma Hopman even refused to carry out direct orders from his superiors to do just that. Bruges was liberated in WW II by Canadian troops on September 12, 1944. Bruges’ population is just over 117,000 - only 19,500 live in the small canal city centre. Over
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