Bruges

I'd had a wonderful time getting to know and experience the city of Brussels. In a day and a half I felt like I had gotten a pretty good taste (pun intended) of what the city had to offer. And yet I still had an entire day left in Belgium. I could spend more time in the city, no doubt wandering the busy streets and maybe finding a museum or church to visit. Or I could go visit one of the other cities in Belgium and see what all the online fuss was about. When Sunday morning rolled around, I decided upon the latter.

I left my hostel around 9:00am and began my trek to the train station. It was a lot further than I'd thought. The streets were not very clean or kept up. The area was a bit sketchy: fine for a bright, sunny morning, but not the kind of place I'd want to be at night. I had left the "old town" and was now experiencing the not-so-pretty side of Brussels.

I got a bit lost on my way to the station. At least I thought I did. I was thrown off by the giant market that was going on in front of the station entrance. People were selling everything you could imagine, from food to clothing to appliances and cleaning products. There were food vendors too. One of them advertised, "Hamburgers, fries, and escargot".

I entered the station and went to a ticket machine to buy my ticket. The ticket only cost 12 euros, but the machine didn't take bills. Coins or card, those were my options. I didn't have 12 euros in coins so I tried my card, already aware that the Brussels machines didn't seem to like my Visa very much. As expected, the machine wouldn't take it. I tried another machine. Nothing. Finally I figured I'd better go and buy something from the cafe so that I could get change to use.

But then I didn't have enough cash to get enough change. So I had to find a cash machine, the first of which didn't work with my card (thankfully the second one did). I bought a granola bar for breakfast and received enough change back to go and buy my ticket. The machine accepted the coins, I got my ticket, all was well.

Except for the fact that I had no idea where to go.

The departure boards didn't list my chosen destination. They didn't list anything even close to my chosen destination. I walked up and down, trying to find someone who worked at the station. Eventually I did. All they said was, "Platform 15". Still not sure I was going in the right direction, I made my way to the platform and caught the next train, at 10:25am. The timetable in the train listed my destination city. I sat down in a comfy seat next to the window and took a deep breath. The morning had been a bit stressful, but I'd still made fairly good time and was finally on my way.

It was a nice train ride, from the green countryside whizzing past to the little old man dressed in a classic conductor's outfit stamping tickets. The journey took just under an hour. By 11:30am, I was walking through the streets of Bruges towards the middle of the city and the main square.

Bruges (Or, Brugge...you don't pronounce the "s") is charming. It's a small town, so it's easy to walk around, but there's so much to see! A five minute walk brought me to old streets and even older buildings. I loved the designs of the buildings and churches. Like Brussels, every street had multiple chocolate shops. Waffle carts and trucks were everywhere. I came across a market selling food, drinks, and little gifts and trinkets. I looked around for a few minutes before continuing on, following the large groups of tourists further into the town.

A few minutes later the street opened up to a giant square. It was larger than the Grand Place in Brussels, and just as incredible. The church, shops, and other buildings surrounding the square date back to the Middle Ages! I loved the colors! In the middle of the square was a small ice skating rink surrounded by booths where vendors sold food, hot drinks, souvenirs, and Christmas decor. The main mode of transportation seemed to be bicycles or horse drawn carriages. People crowded the area, carrying bags of chocolate and taking pictures. And every fifteen minutes a "song" would ring down from the old bell tower. It was lovely.

I took my time exploring the main square, perusing the souvenir and Christmas booths, taking lots of pictures, and watching people wipe out on the ice skating rink. After awhile I started to wander down the nearby streets. I went into Chocolate shop after chocolate shop, just looking at the awesome works of art created by the various chocolatiers. There were tools made of chocolate, sculptures and houses made of chocolate, puzzles made of chocolate...I can't imagine the time it must've taken to create some of those things!

I went into a couple of beautiful churches near the square, and then made my way through a park and back across the canal, trying to avoid getting run over by the horse drawn carriages hat sped by every few minutes. It was interesting to see the differences between Bruges and Brussels, the biggest of which was language. In Brussels nearly everyone speaks French. You see it and hear it everywhere. In Bruges everyone speaks Dutch. Both of these are national languages of Belgium, but it was so strange to have different cities within the same country speaking entirely different languages.

When I was done window shopping I decided to go back through the main square. I couldn't resist the ice rink, so I paid the five euros for entry and a pair of skates. After a bit of trial and error I discovered I'm a European shoe size 39 (the sizing thing really threw me off for a minute). The rink had but a handful of people on it. It took me a few minutes to get used to skating with my heavy bag over my shoulder, but once I did it was great. The sun was shining, I was ice skating in a beautiful European square, bells were ringing, and the smell of waffles filled the air. It was one of those, "Wow, I'm actually here," moments.

I skated for about a half an hour. By that time is was 2:30pm and I figured I should probably start thinking about getting back to the train station. I took my time, stopping to buy a waffle for lunch and to look again in the chocolate shops. I bough some chocolate this time to take back as a souvenir. A few minutes later I passed by a shop that claimed to have, "the best hot chocolate", and decided to try some. It was really good. So, with a bag of chocolates in one hand and a cup of chocolate in the other, I walked back through the cobbled streets of Bruges towards the train station.

The return train left at 4:00pm. I arrived in Brussels an hour later and took the metro back to the Grand Place, where I got the rest of my souvenir shopping done at the shops in the surrounding streets. An hour or so later I decided to treat myself to real food, since my diet had mostly consisted of waffles and chocolate samples over the last couple of days. I went to a place called, "Brussels Grill" and orgered grilled shrimp scampi. It was delicious. I also ordered a beer, since I am, after all, in Belgium. They really love their Beer here, and there are places with over 2,000 different kinds! I tried the "tripel karmeleit". For beer, it was actually really good!

When I'd finished dinner I took one last walk around the beautiful, lit up Grand Place before heading back to my hostel. I was exhausted. I packed my things so they'd be ready to go in the morning, set my alarm, and hung out in the room while waiting for the game to start at 10:05pm. I couldn't watch it, but I was able to follow along via Twitter. I stayed awake until half time before finally giving in and going to sleep.

At 5:30am Monday morning I rolled out of bed, grabbed my bags, and left the hostel. The walk to the metro was about five minutes, and though it was dark there were a few people out and about, so it wasn't that bad. I go to the train station, found the airport shuttle, and we took off towards the airport 6:00am. When we were a couple of miles away from the airport, the bus stopped. The driver stood up, said something in French, and walked off the bus. Confused, those of us who only spoke English began looking around to see what other people on the bus were doing. Someone noticed and said, "He says to get off and walk ten minutes to other bus". It was really weird, and I didn't know why we had to walk to another bus, but I followed the other passengers down the dark road anyway.

A few minutes of walking brought us to a roundabout filled with people and vehicles. The people were holding signs and blocking the exits. Apparently, there was a transportation strike, and these people were blocking the way to and from the airport. The bus had to drop us off because it was unable to get through the blockade. We walked another few minutes, passing a group of travelers lugging suitcases in the opposite direction, until we finally came to another shuttle bus. I got on, we waiting for the slower walkers to arrive, and then we were off, at the airport in just a couple of minutes. A bit inconvenient, but at least I got there eventually.

Security was quick. I bought some breakfast and walked to my gate, arriving there an hour early. Belgium exceeded my expectations. I really enjoyed both Brussels and Bruges and would recommend them to anyone planning on visiting Europe. Though I'm not as determined to go back like with London or Rome, I would definitely return here if the opportunity arose.

I can't believe I only have one weekend left! Last but not least...Munich!