Blogs from West Flanders, Belgium, Europe - page 2

Set off from Zeebrugge-Strand station at 9am and arrived in Brugge 20 minutes later. The weather forecast was not brilliant but we were blessed with more sun than rain. What a beautiful city with new vistas round every corner. We enjoyed a late breakfast in a beautiful old cafe before embarking on a lengthy tour by foot. ... read more

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 ... read more

Breakfast this morning was another chance to meet old crew members, our waiter had served us breakfast on our last cruise too. He remembered everything, right down to Gary loving eggs Benedict. We decided this morning to take the shorter trip to blankenberge rather than spend time travelling to bruges. Really glad that we did because it's a fantastic town. The weather, initially, left little to be desired. Very cold and the icy wind was funnelled between the buildings and right into our faces. It warmed up though and, right now, I'm writing this whilst sat outside a small cafe drinking a coffee. I had an Irish coffee and Barbara wanted to taste it.... she ended up just planting her entire nose and face in my drink... pictures will be submitted for proof. We have already ... read more

Rano ma postupne budili odchadzajuci spolubyvajuci. Nakonec som sa vykopal na bufetove ranajky. Tam to vyzeralo ako v neakej tackarne. Syry, salamy, sunka, chleba, kopa natierkovych syrov, corn flakes, hrusky, jablka, stroj na dzus a dalsi na kavu (vsemozne verzie) z automatu si davam kapucino. Balim si na obed aj jeden chleba, berem aj jablko a hrusku, no a vajicko na tvrdo. Idem spravit check out. Na recepcii uz ina baba. Tez mlada, mozno este studentka na vs. Uplne nic po ang nevedela, musela zavolat chlapika z kanclu. To uz co je, ked mlady lude v zapadnej europe co pracuju v hosteli nevedia ang. Nuz nechavam si tu batoh a prieskum mini mesta. Ono stare mesto prakticky len dve ulice. Ako kazde europske mesto nesmie chybat kostol, nakupne stredisko, trh, restiky, obchody, renesancne domy, poulicny muzikanti, ... read more

On 21 June we got up and had breakfast very early in the morning, and left for the station. Mark had purchased the tickets for InterCity Rail for us to travel at the specific time. Amsterdam Centraal station is one of the major stations in Europe. Eurostar is scheduled to arrive at Amsterdam Centraal Station in 2019 and we could see the construction of the new terminal from the platform where we were waiting for the train for Brussels. The InterCity train, ‘Thalys’ looked very impressive and it offered us a comfortable ride between Amsterdam and Bruxelles-Midi. Upon arrival at Bruxelles-Midi, we realized that the language had been changed. Mark asked the station staff which platform he should go to catch the train for Bruges; the station staff replied in French. The train for Bruges departed ... read more