You're Doing It Wrong

Great trip continues. I bought about 9 kinds of Belgian chocolate today and sampled it all and then wasn’t hungry for dinner. I ate something anyway and ordered a salad with goat cheese and bacon which was more goat cheese and bacon than salad. Way to make salad, Belgium. (Not complaining.)

I bought a bag of Belgian fudge which tasted like candy corn. Will re-wrap and hand off as a gift. Just kidding. (kinda). But everything else was amazing.

We took it easy today. A lot of the sights seemed so similar to things we’ve already seen we sort of glanced and moved on. We sat in the park for an hour and read our books and watched people play with their dogs.

First crisis of the trip. I have numerous itineraries in my computer, Google drive and email plus sent to other people. I made a single sheet cheat sheet with everything on it. And I wrote my Auntie’s phone number on it with a pen – meaning this was the only place I had the phone number. And guess what I lost?

Yeah, so I have calls in to husband and father to email us the phone number so we can remind her that we arrive tomorrow. Long day of travel tomorrow with a total of 4 (!) trains.

Belgian beer and chocolate: completely as advertised. Recommend.

Doesn’t Gent sound like a town that people should be writing limericks about?

I thought having the laptop would be handy for blog posting but what I’ve been using it for the last half hour is looking up the best places to get croquettes in Bruges. (Where we’re going next.) We missed out on the place that was recommended to us here.

Gent is wonderful. I was in love with it 15 minutes after we got here. I didn’t hate Brussels but it’s quieter here and I think the people a tad friendlier. It’s busy but not chaotic. We’ve had really terrific meals the past 2 nights. And our hotel is wonderful. Excellent hospitality, great room, convenient location.

We’ve spent most of our time walking around, enjoying the weather and scenery.

This morning we went to the botanical garden and then spent most of the day at the Museum of Fine Arts. In the afternoon we walked around and sat in the sun by the canal before finding dinner.

I put Pixelmator on the laptop and am still learning to use it. Yes, there was major tweakage on this photo.

More time tomorrow before we go to Bruges. Our hotel host says it’s 23 minutes on the train. I said: it takes me longer to get to work. There are a few more things we’re hoping to check out here before we go to Bruges.

Two nights in Bruges and then to Bad Kissingen to visit the nonagenarian.

Before we do anything, if you haven’t seen the Daily Show clip on the Washington football team, please do so now.

Now back to Belgium.

We watched a half episode of Big Bang Theory dubbed in French. Hilarious.

Today we went to the European Union visitor center which was amazing. To see how far this vision goes back and how much work went into making it a reality. I have to say I was swept away by the presentation of the process for making a law and thinking how great it was.

Until I remembered that I was being shown an ideal of how the process works. I’m sure you could make an equally group-huggy video about the US Congress or the National Congress of American Indians but when you have some insight into how process actually works, it’s not quite as magical.

Not intending to knock it because giant collaborative efforts aren’t pretty – just pointing out that I know in reality there’s a lot more involved in making things happen.

In the afternoon we went to the fine arts museum which is housed together with the modern arts museum and the old masters museum and one or 2 other exhibits. We arrived late in the day (even skipping lunch, just like I would do with Bob) so it was a rush through. I told Erin I saw everything by jogging through the galleries.

We’re in a bit earlier tonight. We have some time here tomorrow and then we’re on our way to Ghent.

Yesterday when we came back from breakfast we noticed one of our curtains was missing. There is a gauzy white curtain and a heavy blackout curtain. The white one was missing. Oh no! We had opened the window wider to get some air in there. We looked down into the courtyard to see if our curtain was there.

It would have been quite a task to unhook it from all its hook and float away, but it seemed odd that the cleaning crew would come in and take our curtain and then go again. But that must be what happened. Our curtain was back when we returned last night.

At least 7 times a day I say, “Let’s never drive here.”

The driving seems extraordinarily insane. Narrow streets. Lots of cars and buses and vans. At one point we saw a car driving through an intersection stop for a car making waiting to make a left and chew the guy out. I’m not clear what the left turn guy was doing wrong or why it was worth the trouble to stop and yell at him. Later we saw a bus that was stalled? in the single lane moving in that direction. So buses and cars trying to get around it had to get in the oncoming traffic lane. So the oncoming traffic was jumping over a low lane divider to get in the bus/taxi lane.

The only car I’ve seen driving slowly was a driving school car. It’s a busy big city so maybe it will be different in a smaller place. However I will share that the guidebook said: don’t even think about driving in the fast lane on Belgian highways. They drive very fast and nose-to-tail and it’s too much if you’re not used to it.

Yesterday at the Belgium history museum I read that the King had met with severed heads of state. I had to pause a moment and try to figure out what that meant. He actually met with several heads of state. Whew.

The first night we were so tired we slept a good 12 hours+ solid. Not so lucky last night. I’m moving slowly this morning but I had my tea and ready to head out the door.

No time for an update. Lovely weather yesterday. Half of Belgium seems to smoke and the other half jog. At one point we thought we saw someone doing both. Chocolate on every street corner. Especially in the touristy zone. The Belgian beer is everything as advertised.

Hopefully time for more comprehensive update later.

The original itinerary was for us to leave on Monday evening and arrive in Frankfurt on Tuesday afternoon. Then we’d have Tuesday as an acclimation day and then take the train to Brussels midday Wednesday.

But when we got to the airport on Monday I was showing my sister my airline app and we noticed that there was a delay on our domestic flight that would get us in after our international flight had taken off. Uh oh.

After a bit of a go around we were given a number of options that all ended with us taking the Tuesday Dulles flight to Frankfurt.

We went back home and returned Tuesday morning at dawn to catch a domestic flight, connected to the Frankfurt flight and arrived in Frankfurt at 7am Wednesday.

Our lovely acclimation period was ruined and we had to eat the Frankfurt hotel room. We spent the day willing ourselves to stay away and wandering around Frankfurt which was cool but some sun breaks and nice to be outside. Snacking also helped.

By the time we got on the train we were nodding off while we were talking. But we made it here. We found our hotel. We’ve had something to eat and we’re going to bed at 7:45pm. More details at 3am?

[Note to Bob, Erin is way better at this than we are together. She bought the SBahn tickets in 3 minutes while explaining to another traveler how to do it. She also is great at directions and maps. We also helped someone in the luggage room so somehow we are the pro travelers at this point.]