Our trip to Belgium brought us to Bruges (Brugge), a medieval city founded in the 9th century by Vikings. Once the most important trading port in the North Sea, our tour guide said it became very rich due to sheep farming, then very poor when fabric prices dropped significantly due to larger ports to trade at nearby. While other wealthier countries and cities updated and replaced buildings over the centuries, Bruges remained too poor to do so, and instead was forced to fix the aging buildings again and again. As a result, it inadvertently became a city with remarkably well-preserved medieval architecture. When people started coming to visit to see, it became rich again. The small circular city is filled with beautiful old buildings, loads of chocolate, waffles, beer, and traditions. We saw the fanfare for the 150th anniversary of the local theater, climbed the belfry tower, and even went to a self-proclaimed vampire’s house for drinks and merriment. Here’s some photo highlights of our time there.
Throughout the city is a series of water canals.One of the old gates in front of the bridge.Walking into the center of the city.The chimney on this building from 1632 has seen better days.One of our first stops: waffles! Belgium is known for them, after all.Beer is also a favorite in Belgium. This bar boasted the “wall of beer” and had an incredible amount of different types of beer to choose from.The ladies bathroom of the bar featured this aquarium tank. Goldfish included.Anyone heard of Belgian Chocolate? The town was full of chocolate shops.Lace is also a tradition in Bruges.And Belgium is the birthplace of Tintin. The woman selling the book said they call him Kuifje in Dutch, which refers to his hairdo. Burg Square includes the Bishop’s Palace and the old Town Hall.The small, dark building on the left is the Basilica of the Holy Blood that supposedly has a cloth with Jesus’s blood on it. And once a year they say it liquefies. One of those Catholic “miracles” I suppose.The belfry tower in the background.For hundreds of years, the Markt Square has been the commercial market place in Bruges.While walking near Markt Square, we saw these people strolling down the center of the road. Soon, we saw more and more people dressed in clothes from the late 1800s.A procession of horse-drawn carriages kept dropping people off in front of a building where a celebration was happening. We found out that the theater was celebrating it’s 150th anniversary. And locals were dressed in clothing from the time of it’s opening 150 years ago. The theater performance was “The Three Musketeers” musical, which is the play that opened the theater all those years ago.Even though it was in Dutch, we ended up deciding to see the performance several nights later. It was a packed house.The Sunday night we were there, we left Paxton with the daughter of our Airbnb hosts and attended the Lucifernum, which is advertised as a weekly party held by a self-proclaimed vampire in his home that was formerly a Masonic Lodge. After the host greeted us, we explored the first part of his house that contained room after room of otherworldly paintings (done by the host’s brother) and written quotations. After our tour of the house, we made our way to the back room where various people were enjoying drinks and some live Gypsy music. Our host, Don Retsin, entertained everyone with his stories and charm. With the musicians; they were as lovely as their music. The next day, we decided to take on the 366 small circular steps to the top of the belfry tower. Inside the belfry, bells play various songs throughout the day. Some of the songs are controlled by this machine, while others are controlled by someone playing a keyboard connected to the bells. On one of our walks in the town, we heard them playing “You’ve Got a Friend In Me” from Toy Story.It was a tiring climb, but the view of Bruges was worth it!After our climb, we took a boat tour of Bruges. Our captain/guide has his pipe resting on the dash much like Captain Haddock would.More Bruges lace.Of all the corny jokes our captain told us, the announcement that we were passing the ugliest statue of a woman looking into a broken light made Paxton laugh out loud. He also pointed out this building that has the smallest gothic window in Europe (to the left of the couple’s head).On our way to find some houses from the 1400s.We found the house from the 1400s. 1436 to be exact. And it’s still being used as a residence.Another 15th century building.We stumbled upon a rubik’s cube competition.This kid was good.On the edge of the city are some windmills.If you look close, you can see Paxton at the top of the stairs. (As you can tell by the guy slowly climbing up, those stairs are steep!)The Bruges police must be very polite!
