Cam & Nat's European Adventure: Happy Easter - Too Much Chocolate in Brugge, Belgium

Easter 2007

Hey guys hope you all had a great Easter! We sure did. It was our first big road trip in the Peugeot that we purchased recently. Unfortunately we had to spend some money on it, to get it up to scratch but now driving like a dream!

Thursday

Cam took Thursday off to finish off the barbeque, garden which he has been doing on weekends for Nat’s friend Ciara (pronounced “Keera”) They had arranged an Easter Monday barbeque without the garden finished. So got stuck in to finish before we headed off. Looks a treat! Check out the photo:

We left home around 4pm. Hoping for it to be about 3pm, but we all took a longer than expected to get away. The traffic very heavy leaving London. It took us about 1 ½ hours to get out of Greater London (about 20 miles), then 45 minutes to do the other 50 miles!

Finally arrived Dover at 6.15pm, and promptly upgraded to next ferry at 6.45pm which was great as it would give us more time to find our hotel in Calais, France.

The ferry ride was quite speccy with a lovely sunset over the ocean and some fresh ocean air (sort of).

We arrived in Calais, then proceeded to get lost trying to find hotel. It took us an 1 ½ hours to find! When we finally arrived, the booking was stuffed up, and Agg had booked a room for four people, but the booking went through as 2 adults, 2 children!!

After some lengthy negotiations, we got our room after negotiating with French man. Agg and Cam went off in search of something that resembled a meal. By this time it was 11:00pm. Unfortunately we had missed out as everything around us was closed. So back to the hotel and bought some soup from reception. Agg had packed some pot noodles which he was keen to tuck into! Check out the picture!

It was quite a sweet hotel room.

Good Friday

After a great nights’ sleep and the best shower ever, breakfast was fresh French croissants and hot coffee. Very yummy!

Packed up the Peugeot and left Calais around 10 and arrived in Bruges about 11am after a pretty non-eventful drive.

After checking into our hostel, up the 3 flights of stairs, we were surprised at how nice our double room with bathroom was. Even had a view, check it out!

We decided to go park car at train station and meet Agg & Emma later on. We didn’t realise how difficult a task that would be! The map we were given didn’t outline which streets were one way! We spent a good hour or so driving up and down trying to find our way out of the town! Even following the horse and cart didn’t help us…

A lovely walk from train station back in to town. A spectacular park, with beautiful gardens, lake and ducks.

First thing that we needed to do was try the legendary snack, Frites & mayo (hot chips). They were lovely!

We decided to get our bearings and to have a look around to work out the major parts of town.

Dropped into a shop to get a fresh Crab meat baguette and Danish. Very tasty!

After passing so many great shops around the place, we passed a bag shop with some great specials. Oh, no that meant we just had to look! Finally got Nat a backpack after many months of “oh I really need a backpack, this bag sucks!”

After some more sightseeing we bumped into Aaron & Emma. We needed that chocolate fix. So off to the supermarket we go! This the only place to get your boxes of chocolate, they are like ¼ of the price of the chocolate shops and just as tasty! A 1 kilo box of Belgium pralines like Cote D’Or or similar would be about €5-6. The beer was just as cheap, about €1 each stubby. For the tastiest fresh Belgium beer that is damn good!

We decided to head home for some rest before we decided to head out for some dinner with Aaron & Emma. First stop was a wine bar for a drink as the we couldn’t get into the restaurant for a couple of hours. The dinner was absolutely lovely! Service was great and the beers huge! Check out the lads enjoying a Hogaarden!

Saturday

After a pretty good hostel breakfast with a few coffees we were ready to face the Bruges tourist hoards. A last minute decision we decided to walk a different way and stumbled across a huge food market.

A fabulous array of cold meats, cheese, yoghurt, chocolate, pastries, coffee, the list goes on and on. There was heaps of dodgy clothes, socks and stuff as well.

We stocked up on some fine fresh food for a picnic. There was so much fine food on offer it was a really tough decision on what to get!

We stopped at this small tea and coffee stall as they were selling coffee as well. Not expecting too much €1. But the coffee was beautiful! Tucked into the coffee with a chocolate croissant bought from the patisserie – delicious!

It was time to head off and explore more of the city. We were off to the Belfry. It is a massive bell tower in the middle of the city. It is 366 steps to the top with a couple of stops along the way to check out some bits of this historic site along the way. This belfry was built in the 11^th century, absolutely amazing architectural feat considering it’s age. After fighting past the waves of tourists we made it up, for some photos and to take in the stunning views of the city and surrounding areas. Back down all those steps to do some more discovering of this lovely city.

On the way to our picnic spot we found some really cool shops. This awesome gourmet food store had the best olive and local cheese quiche that we have ever tasted!

We discovered a retro style store where Cam bought a Combi money box in lime green! By this time we were starving so it was off to feast on all our lovely picnic food. A spot by the canal with our mp3 player, lovely food, bottle of wine, the sun shining and each other’s company. It was a really great way to kill an afternoon. The yoghurt we got at the market was the best that either of us had ever had. It was sooooo creamy and smooth, with sweet fresh strawberries on top. This long lunch had to come to an end. So pack up the stuff and time to walk off all the food and wine.

We followed a canal around the outskirts of the city and ended up at some windmills. There are 5 in total and they are still functioning although I don’t know if they are still pumping water? Got a couple of pictures (of course) and a bit of chilling out, before heading back to our room to get cleaned up for dinner. But not before finding a lovely pub on the canal to chill out with a coldie after a really tough day!!

Tonight we went to a restaurant to try a local dish or two. Found this lovely café underneath a hotel around the corner from us. The waiter was very friendly and helpful. Cam ordered a local

dish, Flemish stew, Nat ordering a Chicken & Mushroom stew. They were very tasty indeed, and were actually well presented for a stew! A real shame that bad service at the end of our meal had to end the night :(

Easter Sunday

Happy Easter! No eggs to be seen, but some more muesli downstairs before heading out. It was rather quiet around the city, although there had been a big bike race that had come through the city early in the morning (not that we were up to see it!) The sun was shining so we decided to get onto a canal boat ride. It was very touristy but still was a great half hour seeing the parts of the city you can’t see by foot. The boat driver/guide was very informative and rattled off all the commentary in 3 languages, very impressive!

Then it was onto Choco Late! A Chocolate festival in the city of chocolate – We have never tasted so much chocolate in our lives! There was a huge array of chocolate stalls, where pretty much every stall had taste tests. Absolutely delicious chocolate, but by the end of it, we were almost sick of the sight of it! There were some cool chocolate sculptures and art, including a 10 feet high swan you could stand in and a 4 foot solid Madonna and Child sculpture (The 15^th century Michaelangelo classic, not the pop queen!) We were really starting to feel ill after all this chocolate, I can believe I am saying this…

Had some more home made salami and cheese sandwiches by the canal, as the restaurants are very expensive.

We then met up with Aaron & Emma at a local tourist brewery for a tour of the premises. Very entertaining, the tour guide was great! Panoramic views of the

city on the roof of the brewery. Very claustrophobic inside the brewery with staircases that would give a navy submarine a run for it’s money! Would have to be a hobbit to work there!

But it was a lot of fun and very informative. Afterwards we were all treated to a fresh beer from the bar. We all had one of their finest beers, including Nat!

Later on we went out for our last supper at a restaurant call The Hobbit with Aaron and Emma. Cam and Aaron had the ‘all you can eat ribs’. And they did! We lost count at how many, but we think they ordered four or five plates of them! Nat was getting sleepy waiting for them to finish! It was a very odd an old restaurant with lots of paraphernalia on the walls and roof. Off to bed to sleep off the ribs.

Monday

Last day. We did more walking around the town. Found some roads we hadn’t walked up yet! Amazing! A nice relaxing day. We didn’t have any set plans, we just took it easy.

Went to one of the many cathedrals (they have 400 churches around the city!) Found the Michaelangelo statue of “Madonna and Child”. This is the only sculpture of his to have left Italy.

We saw some great food on offer at reasonable prices when we visited the brewery the day before. Cam tucked into a pork knuckle which was very tasty. Nat went for the pasta which was a little disappointing but with the fresh local beer you can’t go wrong!

One more tick for the list, Waffles. We found a nice little waffle shop and ordered of course, waffles drizzled with local chocolate. Found a spot by canal to tuck into them. Very nice indeed!

We left Bruges about 4pm. After doing some backtracking and circles we finally found our way back to Calais.

A dodgy dinner in Calais at an even dodgier pub (nothing was open), before boarding the boat about 8pm. Pretty uneventful ferry ride home. Arrived back in Dover about 9pm. It was a very easy drive home and arrived home about 10.30pm, exhausted.