Basically that's all I had in mind for Brussels besides the fact
that it is pretty and near Brugge. Clearly I had not done my research.
When we finally made it here (a train may have been missed) we
made friends with three Canadian guys in our hostel. I am pretty sure their
names were Ethan, Josh, and Jackie, but I am not very good with names so who
knows. We ended up going out and exploring the city with them that night. It
was beautiful. At night all the buildings in the square are lit up, but down
lie down to get a better view because the cops are not a fan of that.
We stayed out pretty late so we decided to just rest the next day,
but the unbelievable happened. I was chatting with my friendsRachel and
Elizabeth on Facebook and it turned out that Rachel had just checked into the
hostel I was at. We were both in Brussels! Of course I freaked out and
ran to her room. We ended up to being able to hang out that much, but I thought
I wasn't going to get to see her until August so this was an amazing surprise.
Talk about timing.
The next day we actually ventured out and just wandered around
Brussels. We even got a Belgian waffle with Belgian chocolate on it. My brother
warned me against it and he was so right. Don't get me wrong, it was delicious,
but I ended up with it all over me and it was just too sweet. But when you pass
by those waffle stands it is hard to refuse. We also managed to see the statue
of the peeing boy (there are replicas of it EVERYWHERE!), and we saw a bunch of
gorgeous parks and government buildings. We even made into another cathedral.
That night we were going to go to Delirium because multiple people had
recommended it to us, but we had some issues printing off our boarding pass for
Barcelona so we didn't make it out. Upside: Spain is basically planned. We have
all of our dates and a place to stay booked in Barcelona and San Sebastián.
That morning I woke up at what felt like the butt crack of dawn
but was really only 8:00 and said goodbye to Rachel 'cause she was off to
Paris. Then we headed to Brugge. It was so adorable and beautiful. Really all
that you need to do is wander the streets. You pass by beautiful homes and
churches and even windmills. Somehow we made it to the main square and I must
say that the area looks a bit different than it did in In Brugge but that could
be due to my poor memory or the fact that we weren't there at night. We found
this small little park between two windmills and next to a river so we decided
to hang out there for a bit. I ended up watching these people play some kind of
lawn game that looked like a lot of fun and shouldn't be too difficult for me
to recreate. It must be a thing 'cause I saw two other groups playing the same
game. Also I bought some fabric to add to my ever expanding collection. Oh, and
I got chips with curry ketchup...that should definitely be a thing in the
states.
And now we are off to Barcelona. Two more weeks and then home, and
although I love to travel, home is sounding really good right now.