The last leg of my Belgium trip was to the city of Brugge. I was early for my train and didn't know if tickets were time sensitive and it turns out not since I took whatever train was at the station. Good information for later since I booked my train back to Maastricht super late and don't plan on staying that long in Brugge.
I had seen a photo of the iconic red Brugge buildings on Instagram and was after that view. I started with the Burg square because I guessed the buildings would be located there. I was wrong. The Burg square had the city hall, museums and the Basilica of Holy Blood. I spent some time admiring the gothic architecture and wandering through the little side streets. The Basilica of Holy Blood looked like an ordinary building from the exterior, but as you climbed the spiral staircase it led to a pretty big church that was almost all gold. It was very shiny!
Adjacent to Burg square was Grote Markt which was another huge square full of restaurants and little shops. There was a large monument in the middle of the square and on one side there were the iconic red buildings! I've seen the red buildings on so many things from cookie tins to bags to postcards and it was awesome to finally be standing right in front of them. I could not stop photographing the beautiful buildings!
In that same square was the Belfry tower which was the medieval bell tower towered above the city. It has a 46-bell carillon that rings every hour.
The churches I visited today were Sint-Salvatorskathedraal and Church of our Lady of Brugge. Bothe were built in the 1300s with soaring towers in the gothic style. I appreciate the churches a lot as they are free to enter and I love admiring the interior. The Church of Our Lady Brugge had beautiful tapestries hung throughout and a treasury you could visit free of charge.
I had seen the chocolate museum in Brussels and finally had time to check it out, after all, Belgium is known for its chocolate. I enjoyed the chocolate museum very much and they took you through the entire history of chocolate, the growing process, and how chocolate is made today. Chocolate originates with the Mayans who ate it with spices. The Europeans then added sugar to chocolate to make it similar to what we have today. There was one queen who liked drinking chocolate so much she drank 5 cups a day! The scientific name for chocolate Théobroma Cacao translates to Food of the Gods as that is what it was thought to be when it was first discovered. It was cool to learn about the different ingredients that went into chocolate such as the chocolate mass, cocoa butter, sugar, and milk powder. White chocolate is white since it doesn't have only chocolate mass, just cocoa butter. Dark chocolate on the other hand is the healthiest since it has the least sugar and most chocolate mass. Perhaps the most interesting part of the museum was the live demonstration where someone went through each step of how to make a chocolate praline. She made the pralines right in front of us and then gave us each one to try! On the way out there was a station where you could try each of the different types of chocolate in an all you can eat bar. I took up the all you can eat challenge and ate a ton of dark chocolate!
With my stomach full of chocolate, I went searching for a traditional Belgium lunch. I found a place called Vlamink '14 that sold mussels and fries. I got a taste of two traditional Belgium dishes - the fries and mussels! The mussels were divine! I had never had mussels so tender and soft. I received a huge bucket of them and really wanted to count the shells but I think it would have been close to 100, at least that's what it felt like. I was so stuffed by the end of it but it was well worth it!
I needed to walk around a bit after my meal so I walked around the river to the Spiegelrei and Papageno statue outside of the theatre. The narrow Medieval cobbled streets of Brugge are so charming although I think it makes getting around by anything with wheels slightly painful.
It had started raining and the last place I visited it was Minnewater park while I waited for my train. The park was built around the river and starting to show signs of spring. There were some beautiful swans swimming in the river under the bridge very peacefully. It was a tranquil scene.
Walking nearly 10 miles everyday these last few days was finally getting to me and the rain was starting to pick up so with that I said goodbye to Belgium and hopped on the train back to Maastricht!
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