After returning to our winter mooring at Flandria in Bruges we spent sometime catching up with friends and with Bruges, which really is a lovely city, despite the constant onslaught of tourists! We went with Sara, Chris, Julie and James to do a ‘free’ (just give the guide a ‘tip’) evening walking tour. Really was fun and informative – got to learn about some local myths and ghost stories and the origin of the stock exchange! It culminates at a local pub with a free beer thrown in – what’s not to like?
The weather was so lovely that we decided trips to the beach were more appropriate than museums, so we visited both Blankenberg and De Haan.
Blankenberg boasts a pier – complete with fish and chips as the lunch of the day – and a series of statues along the promenade –
whilst De Haan is more sedate with some stunning 30s buildings.
Both have stunning sandy beaches where everyone was sun bathing, walking, paddling and some even swimming! Not bad for mid October!
And then Lisa, Freddie and Alex (Lisa’s boyfriend) came out for a few days – bit of a rush especially as they were delayed at the tunnel for a couple of hours as a train ahead had broken down in the tunnel! We did visit some museums with them – the Chocolate museum, the Frites museum, the Lamp museum and the Salvdore Dal;y exhibition. Bruges was even more packed than usual on the Sunday as the Bruges marathon was taking place so it was difficult to get through the Mrkt to get to the Chocolate museum, which was uncomfortably crowded! Learnt something about the history and production of chocolate but it was a little disappointing given the crowds. But we rewarded ourselves with gauffres and hot chocolate at the jungle café
The lamp museum, on the other hand, was empty apart from us, and really quite interesting!
Never knew there was sooo much to learn about the humble potato until we went to the Frites museum! And I’m sure you can guess what we had for lunch that day!
Needed our frites to fortify us before the Salvador Dali exhibition! Have to say I am not a Dali fan but Alex, Adrian and Lisa seemed to enjoy it – Fred was with me on this!
Lisa and Alex went off on their last evening to do the evening walk and thoroughly enjoyed it together. Tuesday morning involved some frantic shopping for chocolate and beer before they had to head back home as Lisa had to be at work on Wednesday afternoon. I went back with them to prepare for my trip to Egypt with my sister. Adrian stayed behind on the boat complete with all the washing and a to do list!
Piedaleau 