The Muscles from Brussels!

Ahoy!

As anyone who saw my status updates will know by now we've just passed into the land of baguettes and beautiful language. Which means it's time for my report on Brussels, Belgium..

It's a pretty cool city; very different to Amsterdam. Whereas the later is largely tourist driven and thus has no office buildings and minimal visible industry, Brussels is a weird fusion of old and new. You can stand in an amazing square in the shadows of these great gothic spires and still see skyscrapers clawing up over the horizon. The streets are still largely cobbled once you wend your way a few blocks from the CBD and much of the architecture retains it's old fashioned style.

A large portion of our time here was spent beer tasting. Over our four days we sampled roughly 18 beers we'd never tasted. We managed to find a cafe called the Delirium Tremens Cafe which has one of the largest beer menus in the world; over 2000 of them! Suffice to say we spent a fair bit of time there. We were lucky enough to have some excellent cafes and bars in the square directly around our hotel as well which provided some delicious meals. You can consistently get great sandwiches for about three euro here which amounts to $4.50 or thereabouts; bargain!

Our first night was taken up with Laura Marling's gig at the Botanic Gardens theatre. She played in a fairly tiny undergound bar - it probably only held a few hundred - and overall put on a good show. It felt much more intimate than last time due to the venue and the set list was very new album heavy as apparently her first record didn't get released there. The crowd was packed with British tourists and expats which seemed to surprise her and of course this meant she was well recieved. It was also interesting to note at least one member of Boy and Bear was in her supporting band this time around.

We spent one day checking out the university town of Leuven which is about a twenty minute train ride away. One of our main reasons for going was to see the Stella Artois brewery which is based there, but we wound up walking and drinking for hours and missing it entirely. We're not very good tourists!

I also checked out the very cool Instrument Museum. For five euros you get to walk around a massive display of instruments while wearing headphones and every time you approach one it starts playing wirelessly for you. They had everything from tribal drums and archaic woodwind pipes through to modern brass and a whole ton of things I'd never laid eyes on before. It was excellent.

Also deserving a mention is the Royal Palace which has the honor of being the most impressive structure I've ever seen. It was a monumental conglomerate of pillars, arches and gates that cannot be done justice without photos. We saw plenty of amazing churches and halls in Brussels but this took the cake for me.

We have one other amusing anecdote but it probably belongs in the 'better in person' category so I'll save it. Ill just say that if you see any angry Belgian Italians shaking three beers and asking after us you'd best steer clear.

Other misc observations about Belgium:

- English is of a slightly lower standard than in Amsterdam but still most people speak a little
- Two of our best service experiences came from expat Brits, including one who gave me a free beer to taste in the Delirium Cafe
- Belgian waffles are amazcrazyamazing.
- Most European toilets have truly been an experience. I may need a seperate blog just to cover all of these but I will say that in Brussels there are open urinals in the street...

Okay that'll do. I typed this entire thing on my iPhone. It took me about 45 minutes so I hope y'all appreciate!

I'll post again from Paris!

Peace

Andy