Epic Summer Part III: Mega Trip--Bruges

I believe we are making the same mistake that many travelers make. We are stopping in Belgium only because we need a place to sleep between Amsterdam and London. But unfortunately, even mega trips have limits, and we can’t see all that we want to or even give as much time as we’d like to each place on our itinerary.

We had originally planned to head out of Amsterdam fairly early, so that we’d have time to stop in Brussels for lunch and see its beautiful Grand Place, or big central square. However as a few factors had us leaving a little later, and traffic on a Friday wasn’t in our favor, we ended up having to scratch the plans to see Brussels and head straight through to Bruges.

The little we saw of Bruges had me falling in love right away. Clean cobblestone streets, lined with tidy brick buildings, and a huge open city square—what is there not to love? The whole feeling of the city is calm and relaxed. No one seems to be in a hurry, and everyone we met was friendly and willing to chat. We arrived in the early evening, when most sites were closing, so we spent our time wandering around.

Just coincidence that he parked in this spot? I think not!

I know I said in a previous post that we aren’t foodies, but you kind of have to be if you visit Belgium. As the land waffles, beer, fries, and chocolate, it’s hard to work up a big enough appetite to sit down to a meal when there are delicious snacks to be had everywhere you look. We started by filling the kids’ (and A’s) request to munch on a waffle. Waffles here are not for breakfast, they’re a snack food, and so we arrived at the perfect time. S had hers with bananas, and the rest of us enjoyed ours with strawberries and cream. The waffles were pretty delicious. They must put some kind of coarse sugar in the batter, because they had a sweet crunch. Mmmm.

 

Our waffle vendor offered to take our picture. Friendly town!

Bananas

Strawberries and Cream

We found a bench in Markt (Market Square) to finish our waffles, and we were all still a bit hungry, so the kids ran over to a friet stand to get some french fries. Although the Dutch will claim they invented fries, to our understanding they originated in Belgium. Legend says they were given the name "french fries" when WWI American soldiers were introduced to them in Belgium. Since the Belgian army at that time spoke French, the Americans nicknamed them french fries. They’re fried twice, once to cook and once to brown, and they are extremely good. Everyone in the lowlands eats them with mayonnaise, which we all enjoyed. Bruges actually has a friet museum, which the kids really wanted to check out, but it was closed, so we’ll have to save that for next time.

 

The kids have no qualms about purchasing treats on their
own--regardless of the language of the country we're in!

Markt is this huge open space that is lined with great old buildings and a tall octagonal bell tower. We enjoyed sitting in the square and just taking it all in.

Markt, the center of Bruges. 

The town's medieval bell tower.

The colorful buildings lining Markt.

This one is my favorite. Looks like it was built from Lego bricks.

In the bell tower courtyard. I think maybe there was too much sugar in the waffles?

From Markt we wound around town, to Burg Square (which was the old center of the city), through the streets and over the canals to the Church of Our Lady.

 

Bruges town hall on Burg Square. They were setting up for an outdoor concert.
(Aaron checked it out later--unfortunately it wasn't too good.) 

One of the canals. I love how the building touch the water. Like Venice, without the decay.

Swans in the canal.

I choose this one for my house.

Love the old fashioned doorbell!

The next morning we had a couple of hours before we had to be on our way, so we acquiesced to E’s wish to climb the bell tower. The tower is unique looking, with a lot of different architecturally styled elements. We climbed the 366 steps, stopping just below the top to get a peak at the giant music box style drum in the carillon room. Then, at the top we were able to look out upon some wonderful views of Bruges. We luckily managed to time our climb just right so that we could watch and hear the bells at the top of the hour. It was interesting to watch how the entire thing is engineered, with cables running from the hammer of each bell to a row of cylinders, where the carillon engages them to play the song. Then we really had our eardrums tested as the giant bell right next to us struck ten o’clock.

Beautiful morning to climb a tower! 

Climbing the tower

At the top for the top of the hour. It was LOUD, but fun to see how all the bells worked.

View of Bruges from the top.

You’re probably not surprised that I have neglected to mention beer. Someone else will have to visit Bruges and let us know what they think of the beer. But I absolutely was not going to pass up the chance to sample their chocolate. The heat and the evening hour had meant that the chocolate shops (at least the ones I believed to be the good ones) had been closed during our stroll the day before. But as things were just opening up after we descended the tower, we made our way to a few places to do some shopping. Our first stop was Dumon, where we picked up an assortment of pretty hand-made chocolate pralines and truffles. Ms. Dumon was very helpful and offered to swap a piece from the box with the white chocolate raspberry praline she saw S eyeing. Then it was on to Godiva, because you can’t go to Belgium without trying some chocolates from this world famous chocolatier. The kids and I each picked a chocolate (milk hazelnut for S, dark caramel for E, and white macadamia nut for me) and we added a cone of chocolate covered strawberries. Finally we sought out The Chocolate Line, which is known for their unique flavor combinations. I just asked the clerk to recommend a 100-gram assortment and we walked away with crazy flavors like lemongrass, wasabi, apple, lime/vodka/passion fruit, bacon, and what she claimed was her favorite, sun-dried tomato/olive/basil. Chocolate shopping is a lot of fun. I highly recommend it. Also, S has now decided that chocolatier may be a future career choice for her. Oh, and I didn’t forget about A. It’s just that he was born with a defect and doesn’t really care for chocolates?

 

At Dumon's. There are no English labels because Ms. Dumon likes to
chat with her customers. 

Too pretty to eat? Not at all! 

If you're looking for something different The Chocolate Line has it!

At that point it was time to say goodbye to Bruges. We had a wonderful, albeit short, visit and highly recommend this quaint, friendly, and delicious town to all our traveling friends.