Bruges

Well, Bruges was all I hoped for and MORE. First of all, the B&B we stayed in was incredible. We had a huge room with bathroom, heated towel bars, lots of space, and breakfast when we wanted it each morning with an array of food that was fantastic! If you are EVER in Bruges, look up the Belfry Bed and Breakfast

So, knowing only what I had seen in the Colin Farrell movie, I found that Bruges is a very small town, but with lots to do. Somehow, in only three days, we packed in a ton of activities. We saw the church from the film and a chocolate museum the first afternoon we arrived. On our second day, we rented bikes and rode out to a neighboring town, along the canals. After riding about 20 miles, we came back to town and climbed the 366 steps to the top of the belfry tower (and then rewarded ourselves with french fries!), then took a brewery tour that entailed climbing another 200+ stairs. It was quite the exercising kind of day! Day three included more sightseeing, and then a great meal of rabbit and flemish beef stew.

As opposed to the French-speaking people in Brussels, Bruges is a Flemish (or Dutch) speaking city. But, everyone here takes FOUR languages in school: Dutch, French, German, and English. So, communicating here has been simple (and it makes me feel quite inadequate for only speaking 1 1/2 languages!)

Can we go back to the french fries??? They are so damn good here, I cannot gush enough. So now, in addition to having gotten used to always having bread and cheese for breakfast every day, I am also eating large quantities of french fries (with large quantities of mayonnaise). I can feel my arteries hardening up even as we speak, but OH MAN this stuff is good. I may have to buy myself an extra seat on the plane coming home! Yummmmmmmm...

While leaving Bruges by bus to get back to the train station, the bus driver suddenly stopped int he middle of the street. Being from San Francisco, I was waiting for him to start screaming at someone (our drivers are pretty surly!) but it was to simply lower his window and chat for a minute or two with a very pregnant woman who was crossing the street. They had a nice little chat and then he continued driving us to the station. Hilarious.