Brugge
Dr Evil’s home town, chocolatecity, a few hours by train from Brussels (a quick word of warning: it’s much easier to get around Belgium if you know one of these two languages: French or German, we managed to catch the train in the wrong direction, away from Brugge, when we got off the Eurostar in Brussels), was our first European destination after about 2 months in England.
Highlights include the main square, walking into a mass in the church there by accident, arguing about directions and which one of us got us lost, ordering a “Mocha” and getting an expresso in an awesome café where coffee comes standard with a small cake/jam/chocolate & different crystalised sugars, awesome dinner at Le Stove (check out Rachel’s expression when she saw the dessert!), realising we’re actually NOT in the UK, hearing people talking in French and German (sometimes to us, to which we just smile and say “Sorry, we’re dumb English-speaking people who haven’t made the effort to learn another language and we feel really lazy because you people seem to know at least 5 languages each”)
Brussels
As soon as you walk out of the train in Brussels, you know you are entering Eurotrash territory. Especially coming from the quaint and chocolatey Brugge. Modern buildings, especially those that house the European Union offices really killed the atmosphere for us. And the cops in cark blue uniforms with soft hats and automatic guns (think the smaller Counter Strike automatics) didn’t help either. But you don’t spend time thinking about the ugly bits. You, like all good tourists, head straight to the attractions and soak in the atmosphere, buy gourmet chocolate, order as many different fine beers as you can drink, and eat mussels in Brussels.
And just now Rachel has come back form the DVD shop (looks like it’s World Cinema Sunday Night tonight for us and our Japanese flatmate, Masumi), so you’ll just have to check out the photos and figure out the rest of the trip yourselves. (We were only there for a weekend, so you didn’t miss much, really). See more at http://picasaweb.google.com/itspeterb -look for the Brugge & Brussels photo album.
