Belgium

Our Belgian portion of the trip started with a super fast train from London to Brussels, and then on to Bruges.  There, we enjoyed our first taste of Belgian beer, a canal tour, and a really nice dinner.

According to Bill and Ryan, the beer in England wasn't great.  Not the case in Belgium!  And, each type of beer has its own glass... here are a couple of examples.  The one on the right comes with its own wooden stand because the bottom of the glass is round.  Bill kept trying to set it on the table by itself... never worked.  

The canals were beautiful.  We got to see them up close by way of a boat tour.

It was in Bruges where we first noticed these stair-stepped gabled roofs (definitely not their official name).  It's interesting to see architecture change in Europe... what I see in Italy is different from France, which is different from Switzerland, etc.  I liked that in Bruges, I saw something new.

We had a great restaurant experience... I tried to compare it to my birthday dinner, but it was hard.  Best best best vs. best best best best?  They're all good.  Although this one had a lot more innovation... think tomato sorbet with parmesan foam.  I wish I could have captured the food, but settled for a group photo outside the restaurant.

Moving on to Brussels, where the highlights were the fries and a bike tour.  The fries speak for themselves - they were amazing.  Especially because they are served with your choice of sauce and little tiny forks!

Aside from the fries, we were struggling to find the charm in Brussels, until a guided bike tour showed us what we were missing.  It took us everywhere, more than we could cover in a day on foot.  And, it was just fun being on bikes.  Brussels still wasn't my favorite, but the tour at least showed us it was better than our first impressions.  

Ryan was assigned back of the line duty, and had to wear this great vest.

Ghent's charm, on the other hand, was immediately recognizable.  It was similar to Bruges because of the canals, but it seemed to have much more to offer... quirky shops, neighborhoods, and good restaurants (although Bruges had plenty of those, too).

















We went to a castle.  Bill got into it... Ryan, not so much.

But mostly we enjoyed walking around.  We found a design museum, cool shops (like soap, inspired by true events), and nice benches, where we could plan the rest of our day.

PS - Waffles!  They really are delicious.  The kind we liked was made from a dough ball being pressed into a waffle iron (as opposed to a liquid batter being poured in).  Mmmmmm.  Dough ball.