Sunday August 4

Move to Bruges, Belfort, Sint-Janhospitaal

This morning we got up, took it easy, then headed on the metro for the Train station at 10 am.  Our train left for Bruges at 10:52-so no snags on the train today.  We did have to stand for the first part of the journey (as far as Ghent) as seating in second class was at a premium.  It's not a 'local culture' thing as there is such a mixture of people from all over the world traveling around here, but we've found it unsettling how you can get ready to go onto a train or move in a cabin and have some folks aggressively elbow themselves in front of you-almost body checking you out of the way.  We're too chilled out to fight hard.

But as far as local culture goes-from Amsterdam to Brussels to maybe even Bruges-there is one thing we've learned.  Don't worry about the car traffic.  It's the bikers who'll kill you.  Seriously-in Amsterdam we noticed as pedestrians we were really on the bottom of the scale.  We'd be walking along a street and see where the cars went, see a bike lane, and not really know where we were supposed to walk.  And that little double 'ding' of an approaching biker at home means 'pardon me if you will', but here it so obviously means 'get the %^&$ out of the way or I'm running you into the bricks'.  Seriously, you have half a second to get out of the way!  We love the idea of bike culture, but we're seeing an attitudinal down-side!

Megan is very happy with my choice of accommodation.  I advertised our Marseille apartment as it was worthy and I'd return.  There was a very small issue in Amsterdam, so I've not advertised.  And the apartment in Brussels was nice but the owner a very poor communicator so I've left it off.  If you haven't got a lot nice to say...  But Bruges!  We are in the heart of the old city in https://www.bonobo.be/en/.  We're in a cute little apartment with sitting area and kitchen separate from bedroom.  We had communicated ahead as we always do that we'd be arriving early (just after noon) and expected to have to stow luggage and go out but the proprietor was ready to show us up to our room, was a fountain of information and just a delight.  I'll edit if this if things go wrong, but right now this is one of our best digs this trip!

Our Apartment Hotel Behind-White Building

Just Around the Corner

We went out of a grocery shop as soon as settled, then waded back out to try some of the very famous local frites (worth it) and then climb up the Belfort.  We bought a Bruges pass good for 14 museums (3 days), but only 4 of them (including the Belfort which we've done) are open tomorrow, so Tuesday will be a day of running around to see what we want.  Tomorrow, we'll go to the three museums we can and likely a canal cruise.  So after Belfort we went to look at Archeologiemuseum (which was mostly geared to young ones) and then had a good look through Sint-Janshospital-an ex-hospital church-like building with lots of the local famous medieval artist's work (Hans Memling).

Frites with Ketchup, Mayo and Onions

View From Belfort

In Sint-Janshospital-Memling Triptych

 

A Bit of 3 O'Clock Bells 

After a break at the apartment we went back out for a walk about town.  Then came home for our dinner.  We'll dine out tomorrow night as we have determined dinners out won't break the budget here like they threatened to in Amsterdam and Brussels!  The walk showed us what a picturesque town this is though!  This may be my favourite place so far!

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13.58 km.   96.33 km over the week.  281 km through trip so far.  Not so bad.