Thursday, February 17, 2005

So we went on this trip right

Sorry. This update about our trip to Brussels is a bit belated. I started at the call centre job last Monday so things have been rather busy. But here we go, for your enjoyment.

A Brussels Experience

We all met up at Waterloo station to hop on the Eurostar, like proper jetsetters. Excitement! It's a bit bizarre to get off the tube from work then hop on a train straight to The Continent, but there you go. It only takes about an hour from London to get to the tunnel and then another hour via Lille, France to Brussels itself.

We arrived in Brussels at about 9.30pm local time and after a manic taxi ride (European drivers are scary!), checked into our lovely four star hotel, selected by Cathy herself.

Day One -

The next morning we started our sightseeing with a wander around one of the central tourist spots in Brussels, Grand'Place. It's a lovely cobblestone square with lots of museums, restaurants and the Town Hall. V. Medieval. We even managed to witness a couple of weddings while we were there.

And then it was off to the most famous landmark in Brussels, the little guy below - Mannekin Pis. He's tiny but has legendary status in Brussels. No tourist shop is without hundreds of replicas of Mannekin Pis. Some of us did even manage to take home some souvenirs of him.

The rest of the day was pretty much spent wandering around Brussels' various tourist attractions including the Museum of Chocolate (surprisingly not enough chocolate) the Royal Palace, Parliament and St Michel Cathedral.

That night we went to one of the many crowded restaurant areas not far from Grand'Place. Now in Brussels they have these areas devoted to one type of restaurant (eg seafood, Italian etc) where men stand outside hollering at passing tourists to come and eat at their particular restaurant. After ignoring them all day (Funnily enough groups of four young women on their own seems to engage their attention pretty quickly), we gave in and had dinner at one of the less intimidating ones and had a lovely traditional 3 course meal and bottle of wine to celebrate Cathy's formal entry into adulthood.

Day Two -

We spent a relaxed last day looking around some of the rest of the sights of Brussels. My highlight was Cinquantenaire park and Le Arch de Triomphe. No, not the one in Paris, but stunning nevertheless. We also saw the European Union headquarters and several more churches and monuments. After some more wandering it was time for us to head back to the hotel and back to London. We boarded the Eurostar at about 4.30pm and arrived back in London by 7.30pm, just in time to grab some Chinese food for tea and mentally prepare ourselves for work the next day. (ugh)

So that was Brussels. All in all a really good holiday. I'll eventually get around to posting some photos from Scotland and Brussels. One day.

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Ooh gotta go I just spotted some snow!!

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