A day in Bruges

June 25 Saturday We meet Mike, our Airbnb host. We talk with him a bit while having our coffee and tea out in the courtyard of our place. Delightful but time to move on and see the actual things rather than talk about them. We're only about 6 miles from the North Sea and are close enough to Holland that they speak Dutch here. Upon recommendation from Mike we take the free walking tour tha starts by the statue in Market Square.

The business model is to offer the tours for free and ask for tips at the end. Mike says that his son-in-law is one of the guides. Sometimes he comes home with just a few euros and sometimes it's 70 or 80. Ours was quite a large group of about a dozen peopel. My guess is that the guide did well today. We learned a lot about Bruge and saw more than we would have on our own. Bruges became a trading center in the 1400's but became even more of a trading center with a connection to the Medici family. The town really flourished. But, then they pissed off the Hapsberg family and all the trade was moved to Antwerp. Bruges became a backwater no place. All the grand buildings deteriorated. In the late 1800's a developer, architect decided to rebuild Bruges in a neoclassical style. So most of what we see today and that brings all of the visitors was built in the late 1800's,early 1900's. There is enough older things that many parts of it are UNESCO certified. There is a Michelangelo sculpture inside the church of our lady. It was stolen twice. First by Napolean and they got it back. Then by Hitler and after the war it was returned.

The owner of the beer distillery was extremely wealthy and had one of the government buildings built. Over the doorway, is a statue of a man on a horse. It is a copy of a statue in France of one of the kings but the head has been changed to be the head of the brewery owner.

After the walking tour, we were ready for lunch and found an Italian place that Mike said had good Italian cuisine. Nick had carbanara and I had spaghetti del mar with clams, oysters, squid.... Both excellent. Now it's time for a boat ride on the canals which we find out on the boat ride tha tthey aren't canals but a river going to the North Sea. Our guide said all the tours are the same so jst look for the one with the shortest line. Our boat driver ha d a good dry wit and we enjoyed him as well as the ride. He pointed out lots of little details.

On the walking tour i noticed a restaurant that had really cool tea cups that had a modern design that was similar to the logo of the local halve moon beer company. We went back to see if we could find it. No one was drinking tea so I didn't see it. There were quite a few souvenir shops but I really didn't want some cheesy, made in China souvenir of Bruges. It is starting to drizzle and we're tired so decide to go back and rest a bit and go out again later. Refreshed after a nap, we head out insearch of a ligt dinner or maybe a Belgian waffle. We've walked by the R&B (ribs and beer) several times and Mike said it was good. We stop and get the last table they had without reservations. I had a good dark beer and we each get a half order. one of the traditional style and one of the chef's special which is juicier and fall off the bone. The chocolate and beer sauce is to die for. So much for the "it's good but keep trying" This is "whatever you did, keep doing it!" It's still early so we walk a bit more and find ourselves at the market square. I think all roads lead to the square. We need to have a waffle before we leave town in the morning. We got one with choclate, whipped cream, ice cream and strawberries. Sure is a good thing that I'm walking so much. Random pictures that are left after I wrote about what we did today.