Valentine's Weekend in Bruges!

   

We had a wonderful Valentine’s weekend in Bruges, Belgium (or as some call it the “Venice of the North”)! We arrived late Friday night and found ourselves wandering the streets, waiting for a knight to pop out and challenge us to a duel. The town felt like a medieval village from a fairy tale with the amazing brick buildings, a pond full of swans and desolate cobble stone streets. Our room was even in the castle tower! Well not really, but we did have to climb a hidden stairwell to get to it, which made it feel mysterious.

  

  

We woke early on Saturday ready to see the city! We enjoyed our first melt in your mouth, perfectly created Belgian waffle at the outdoor market and washed it down with a hot coffee and tea from a quaint little tea shop. We quickly learned that Belgium is a gluten-avoiders worst nightmare but hey, you only live once so sometimes you just have to splurge... So, with our belly’s full and taste buds happy, we made our way to the old fashion windmills on the (what used to be) out skirts of town (BTW notice the change in jacket choice as we're finally enjoying Europe's warmer weather!).

  

After walking the town, we decided to rest our feet and hopped on a boat cruise to observe the city from a different view. Like Venice, there is a large canal that runs through Bruges that was once used for merchant ships. The boat tour provided a unique way to see the city and it led us our next destination, a little brewery next to the water. We enjoyed our first taste of true Belgian beer and were not disappointed (it’s much tastier than the German beer!). 

  


By this time, we had experienced the legendary Belgian waffles and beer but still needed to taste the famous Belgian chocolate. There were chocolate shops on every street corner all claiming to be the best, so we figured we couldn’t go wrong. We found one little shop that seemed to have a nice vibe and oh man... talk about a tasty treat! Mmm Mmm Mmm!

Church of Our Lady of Bruges

Bruges City Hall

   

With our taste-buds exploding with delight, we continued our tour of the town. We saw city hall, town square and the giant Belfry and listened to one of the many bell concerts that happen throughout the day (unfortunately we did not get to hear a live concert, but maybe next time we visit Bruges we will). We took a peek inside the Basilica of the Holy Blood and the Church of Our Lady of Bruges which houses Michelangelo’s sculpture “Madonna of Bruges”.

THE pub where New Belgium began!

     

Finally, at 4pm we got to experience one of Jeff’s Must Do’s in Belgium... we drank a beer at THE pub where the idea of Fort Collin’s New Belgium began. ‘t Brugs Bertje was great! It’s a small brewery off the main drag with a definite local feel and tasty beverages. They had dried hops hanging from the ceiling, hundreds of beer glasses behind the bar and barely enough seats to house a soccer team. TOO Fun!

Since we were celebrating a belated Valentine’s Day, we treated ourselves to a fancy dinner at one of the local restaurants. We usually like to try the “famous dish” when we travel to a new place, however, from what we read, Belgium’s famous dish is muscles and we just couldn’t bring ourselves to order them... so instead, we thoroughly enjoyed our fancy fish and filet!

We finished the evening by wandering into a random LED light show followed by a night cap on an outdoor patio, enjoying an evening view of the canal. What a wonderful day! 

View from the Belfry

   

We woke Sunday ready to finish our tour of Bruges. We indulged in another delicious waffle then worked it off by climbing the 366 stairs to the top of the Belfry tower. It was a perfect blue-sky day which made for incredible panoramic views of the city. Plus, we got to hear the bells toll while standing in the top portion of the tower. Talk about a vibration! 

    

Climbing the Belfry was our last major “Bruges To Do”, so we spent the rest of Sunday enjoying a leisurely walk around the city exploring new streets and shops we hadn’t yet seen. We had drinks with a side of cheese and spicy mustard (who knew that was a tasty combination?) at De Garre which also has a fantastic local-feel, enjoyed chocolates from a couple more local shops, and finished our Valentine’s weekend at Lover’s Bridge. Rumor has it, if you walk across Lover’s Bridge and kiss at the end your love will be sealed for eternity, so of course we did that! 

Lover's Bridge

Up until this point, our Valentine’s weekend was wonderful and flawless and in spite of a one-hour bus delay followed by an additional 35-minute delay followed by the bus never actually showing up, which then resulted in us catching a late train to Brussels, getting a hotel and expanding our vacation by one more night, only to experience an impromptu to morning workout at the Brussels’ train station when we found out that the train we were supposed to catch could not actually make it to the train station we were at, so we needed to catch a different to train that took us to our train at the other train station, meaning we had to run through two different train stations first thing in the morning… yes, besides that, we had a fantastic weekend! The end of the trip was crazy and exhausting, but all in all we can say it was an almost perfect and very memorable Valentine’s weekend and one we are both thankful to have experienced together!

Next up, Karneval!

Our one picture from Brussels

  

 

Classic Burger, Pickles or Both?