Bruges

It's been awhile since I posted anything here, and I am so back logged with all the trips we've taken that I'm just going to skip ahead to the most recent, Bruges.  I hope to go back and share some really spectacular things we've seen this summer, but we'll see. :)

The kids and Scott had a 3 day weekend, and Scott was interested in trying to drive on the continent.  I did some research and we decided on Bruges.  Then we hesitated, because of the warnings of probably terrorist attacks in France, Germany or the UK.  But since we're already in the UK, and Bruges is probably up there with Oxford for a possible attack, we decided to go ahead.  

We drove the 2.5 hours to Dover on Friday night, after work.  We stayed at a Holiday Inn Express I got for cheap, so we could leave in the morning.  I got a great deal on a ferry - £42 (about $68) roundtrip for all four of us, plus our car!  For comparison, riding the Eurorail would have cost over £300, and we wouldn't have our car.  The Chunnel would have been about £80, and a bit faster, but we wouldn't have been able to see the white cliffs of Dover, and, well, we would have been in a tunnel under the sea.  That would not be my happy place. 

 Driving onto the ferry in Dover 

The White Cliffs of Dover, but the morning was foggy

 The girls next to our parked car on the ferry

 So there are all these rules about driving your car into France... one is that you have to place decals in the right place on your headlights so they don't aim into people's eyes on the opposite side of the road.  Did you know headlights weren't aimed straight?  I didn't.

 On the ferry, crossing the English Channel

Cambria loves looking over the side... that pink sweater is somewhere in Belgium now, sigh.

 Meridian on the ferry

Road signs in France... we took the Dunkerque route... *this* time.

Brilliant!  A different speed for rain!  Vive le France!

Each town had a sign like this, I only caught this one as we drove by.

 Entering Belgium, after about 30 minutes on the road.

 We didn't have a firm plan for lunch, but I wanted to eat in a seaside town.  After much searching, I got exactly what I wanted... seats ON the beach, in the small tourist town of Koksijde.  Excellent weather, excellent lunch!  English chefs should take note - Belgian chefs know how to cook a steak!  Yum!

 

 Cambria was hiding under my sweater.  LOL 

 Ahhhh, sangria on the beach.  Bliss.

Meridian got the mussels and frites (fries).  Mussels are a specialty of Belgium.  Who knew? (Belgians, probably)

 After lunch, we walked along the beach a little, and touched the North Sea.

 Meridian and Scott, chalking up another sea touched. :)

 For my friends in Britain - a roundabout where you go right, and look left!  Oi!

Our hotel - we turned the wrong way when we got off the bus into town (from the train station, where we parked), and went about 20 minutes out of our way.  Lame.  But not the hotel's fault. 

Teeny tiny little steps up to our room! 

The Bell Tower in the Markt (Market) square - there's a picture below of me in the red door that is over the double doors.  We did climb all the way to the windows above the clock on our last day in Bruges.

 Meridian in front of her namesake restaurant. 

 There's a lot of outdoor eating in Bruges, we selected a restaurant with a good looking special board, away from the bustle of the main square.

Me and Meridian at dinner

 160 beers are brewed in Belgium.  This is the only brand brewed in Bruges.  Turned out it was too fizzy for me, I had to switch to the paler ale which is usually not my thing.

 

We all enjoyed the little fire tower we sat next to. :) 

 Dining on the Market Square was neat, but too crowded for me. 

 The buildings were so beautiful, everywhere we turned.

 Cambria thought it was funny that she was wearing a sweater and eating ice cream. :)  Bell Tower (Belfort) in the background.

 Night view of the Belfort

Check it out, a pub named Don Quixote, but in Dutch? or Flemish? 

Part of our breakfast, a boiled egg.

 The rest of our breakfast - meats (one of which we couldn't identify) cheeses, fruit, toast and rolls.

 Our first stop leaving our hotel the first morning?  Dumon Chocolatier. 

There are 53 chocolate shops in Bruges - we hit about 15.  Dumon was recommended by Rick Steves, but we liked almost every other one better.  At both Dumon locations, the people were short with us.  They were just done with tourists, I think.  Too bad, because the chocolate was good, but they pushed an assortment on us that we wouldn't have chosen. We would have been happier picking out individual pieces, but since they weren't marked, we'd have to ask about each one, and the clerk was in no mood to explain.  Too bad.

 Frites!  Belgium is known for their double-fried fries, and now we know why.  Yummy!

I don't understand most of this.  LOL 

I've since learned that the reason their mayo is so good is it has double the egg yolks.  Mmmmmmm

This was a really neat gizmo we happened upon in the Belfort building.  It was a touchscreen piano, and the notes played out of speakers that were amplified by spinning, um, concave things.   It was really neat.

Playing the Belfort gizmo

 Cambria, overlooking the courtyard

 Cambria really dug all the water pumps in town. This one was in the Belfort courtyard.

 

 Wooden Shoes!

 Bobbin Lace!

 This is the Basilica of the Holy Blood.  It's an old church (1150) where a vial of Jesus' blood brought back by Crusaders is kept.  

 The outside of the Basilica is very ornate. 

Inside, Cambria checks out the candles.  

 See the Basilica in the lower right hand corner?  The City Hall (1400) dwarfs it.

 City Hall also has a weird double winding chimney on it.  Hm. 

 Canal, with the Belfort tower in the background.  So pretty!

 Same picture, with us in it. :) 

 On a canal boat tour, fun!

 Cambria's favorite part, hand in the water!

Some of the canal bridges are really low!

Smallest window in Bruges. We're copying Aunt Shelly's photo. :) 

 Cambria found this little staircase that led down to the water.  We waved at a canal boat. :) 

 In the courtyard where my younger brother proposed to his wife. :)

 We popped into the Church of Our Lady to see a REAL Michelangelo (1504) statue, "Madonna and Child".  Wow.

 So, you stir the chocolate into your coffee, and squeeze in the vial of booze.  Nice. 

De Halve Maan Brewery - we ate lunch then took a tour.

 Cambria and her beer.  LOL  Actually, the Zot is mine, and the Straffe Hendrik (9%, whoa!) is Scott's. 

 Bruges is a city of beer, chocolate and fries.  What's not to love?

 On the brewery tour, a giant beer!

 

 Hobgoblin is one of our favorite British beers!

 Meridian on top of the brewery.

 All of us on the rooftop!

 In front of the huge beer containers... Strange Brew, anyone?  LOL 

 Our assorted box of chocolates that I was whining (whinging, lol) about earlier.  See all the white chocolate?  White chocolate is NOT chocolate!!!

 De Halve Maan logo in 3D.

 Another water pump.  Cambria was fascinated. 

Watching chocolate being made in one of the many shops. 

 Cambria digs into her flying saucers on our carriage ride. We ate a LOT of sugar on this trip.

 Me and Scott in the carriage, clip clopping through Bruges.

 The girls in the carriage.  The guide was full of corny jokes - Scott said it was like the Bruges version of the Jungle Cruise. :) 

 Searching for dinner, Meridian gave Cam a lift. :) 

 Found our dinner!  De Vlaamische Pot (The Flemish Pot)  A cute little place in an old house.  Great food, but the service was, though friendly, especially poor.  We wouldn't see our waiter (or any staff, for that matter) for 30 minutes at a time.  The free refills on our frites (your plate is not supposed to get empty) didn't come until after we were done eating.  No second beverages.  AND to top it all off, he cleared our plates and disappeared for 30 minutes, at which point I took the girls outside, since it was a nice quiet restaurant and they were getting antsy.  The waiter came outside and told me I forgot the bill!  I said, "My husband is upstairs waiting for the bill". He said, "But the bill is downstairs. OH, I will go tell him!"  Yeah, buddy, do you think that would be a good idea?  Turns out you needed your table number to pay anyway, which we had no way of getting. Scott said he did apologize.  But he didn't take off the up-sell from appetizer mussels to full dinner mussels that Meridian didn't even come close to finishing, even though he acknowledged that it was a poor up-sell when he picked up her less-than-half-eaten dinner.  Anyway, moving on...

It WAS a very cute restaurant, and the food was delicious. I forgot to take food pics, drat. 

 Cambria at breakfast in our hotel.  Hot chocolate in the jug.

 An odd fountain spout

 The girls, climbing the stairs up the bell tower.  

 The steps you can see through are my least favorite kind.  366 steps sounds like a lot less than it is. :)

This was cool - at the top, there are mile markers for different cities.  Here's "Londen" - 230 kilometers.

 The girls in front of one of the 47 bells.  

 If you look at the picture of the Bell Tower, you can see these mesh windows above the clock.  Pretty cool. 

Looking down on Markt square

 Cambria, still being short, gets a boost from her dad. :)

 On the steps - "Hold the rail!" "Hold the rope!"

 Looking up at the structure within the bell tower.  Reminds me of Disney's Hunchback of Notre Dame. :)

 Inside the tower - on the right you can see through the small window into the stair well.

Me and Cambria in the doorway, about 2/3 of the way down.

More frites upon our safe return to solid ground.  Mayo on one side, tomato curry on the other. Yum.

We went into a fantastic Christmas shop, Kathe Wohlfahrt.  We got a little mushroom man smoker, and a candle carousel.  Very cool souvenirs, even if they are German (and not Belgian). :) 

OK, so this Vanilla chocolate, with little crunchies on the top, was fan-freakin-tastic!

 Ah, the waffles.  One with chocolate, one with whipped cream.  Hot and delicious. 

Part of the deliciousness?  Little chunks of crunchy sugar in the waffle.  Divine.

 Meridian on the canal wall.

 The Beer Temple.  LOL

 Dumon.  It was tasty, just not friendly.  End of season, probably.

 At the last minute, I realized how tiring it had been trying to find the English on all the signs, and took a couple pictures.  Most signs had Dutch, French and English, but sometimes there were more languages.  Don't get me wrong, I'm super glad they had English, but when you're trying to figure out where to eat, finding the English on the menu boards was exhausting.

 We did learn that Kip is Chicken in Dutch. :)

 A windmill! In Bruges, on our drive out.

Another windmill!  

Crossing a river, not sure if we're still in Belgium or if this was the Netherlands.  Pretty!

 Sluis, the nearest town in The Netherlands.  We stopped at a grocery store for lunch makings and beer to take home. :)

OK, so for my American friends... you  know those stickers that are oval shaped and say GB and are on the backs of some cars?  Maybe you all already know this, but they identify the car as being from Great Britain when the car is driven into other countries!  Now, though, because of the European Union, newer license plates incorporate the country identification onto the actual plate.  See examples below!

 

Belgium

 

France

 

 Scotland (Ecosse) a.k.a. Great Britain

 Germany (Deutschland)

 Our lunch.  Excellent cheese, salami, bread, olives and strawberries.  We had to eat in the car, because we were running out of time to catch our ferry.

 Back into France, briefly

 Cambria, as we return to England... White Cliffs of Dover in the background!

 Meridian with the cliffs

Me, still the cliffs. :)

 And Scott with the cliffs.  :)

 Cambria loves looking over the ferry rail.  :)  We had some rough seas when we left France, tilting the whole boat crazily, but it did settle down by the time we got back to England.

 Sunset in Dover

Neat

 The famous cliffs of chalk.

And look, a building built right into the cliffs!  

 So our time in Belgium was short but sweet.  I would recommend going in the spring though, when the shopkeepers are fresh.  I think most of the town had just about had it with tourists for the year.  Tourism is their main industry, but I can see how explaining the same thing 60 times a day can get on your nerves. :)