Blogs from Belgium, Europe - page 18

We spent 3 days in this charming town: Ypres in French, Ieper in Flemish. I have heard that the British pronounced it "Wipers"! We like the Grote Markt, the main square, where there is always some activity going on, ie. markets, musical concerts, street drama, demonstrations. Most of the town was destroyed in the First World War. Buildings, such as the Cloth Hall and the Cathedral, were reconstructed to their original state--an amazing accomplishment. We attended the Last Post twice at the Menin Gate. This moving ceremony has been performed by buglers every evening at 8pm, since 1927* when the Gate was inaugurated as a memorial to the British and Commonwealth soldiers who died in the Ypres Salient area during WW1 and were never found. Their names are engraved on the walls. *For the years during ... read more

For obvious security reasons, as has been our policy in recent times not to visit iconic sites at certain times being so fraught with potentially unexpected danger, we chose not to visit the Grand Place on New Year's Day itself, but instead found ourselves being drawn to this focal centre of the city on the day after the big event. Although the festivities of the season were being slowly run down and the decorative lights gradually removed from the city, throngs of people lingered across the city, capital of Belgium and the European Union. Everywhere we walked, families strolled around taking in the last of the festive atmosphere. Patrons filled the cafes, restaurants and shops as the usual early winter darkness swept the country and brilliantly coloured hues of every description took control of the night. ... read more

We started very early this morning, alarm at 5 am, so we would not miss our 8:04 Eurostar train to Brussels. We had planned to spend a good 7 hours in the city, enough to get a good overview. Well plans don’t always work out as intended. We arrived to St Pancras international rail station just at the cut off time to board the train. We got through passport control and security quickly enough and still had plenty of time to comfortably board the train without rushing. Trains in Europe pretty much leave on time. We had a 4-seat table seat, booked with the thought we may have it all to ourselves, which we did not. That however turned out to be a bonus because we sat next to a wonderful couple (Jack & Sara) and ... read more

When I told some clever so and so that we had booked a late November few days in Bruges I was told it would be horrible weather in that way some people just love to put your plans down. Sometimes though people can get it badly wrong, the whole time we were there the weather was just perfect, sub zero temperatures but full sun all the time during the day and the crispest of nights. This helped us have a dream of a trip in part in spired by the excellent if slightly violent 'In Bruges' movie. We flew Brussels air Edinburgh to Brussells and really enjoyed the chuntering train that took us a tour of Brussells before surging onto Bruges. Our ethos for the trip was to have the best time we could on a ... read more

Geo: 51.2977, 4.69013Het staat vast, we komen enkel nog in Malle wandelen als er 0% kans op neerslag is. De vorige keer hebben we nog geluk gehad, toen het begon te regenen zaten we juist op een rustpost en na een extra trappist was het terug droog. Dit keer niet zoveel geluk, een beetje na de eerste rustpost waar we achteraf gezien gelukkig niet gestopt zijn omdat er zoveel volk zat is het begonnen motregenen en het is niet echt meer gestopt. Elke keer dat het een beetje droger werd bleek heb enkel een kleine adempauze te zijn om daarna dubbel zo hard te regenen. Kortom, we zijn uiteindelijk door en door nat terug aan de auto gekomen. Gelukkig toch nog een beetje mooi weer gehad zodat we van de prachtige herfstkleuren konden genieten. Want ondanks ... read more