This summer I got a chance to visit the same countries that I visited 10 years ago but of course with additional time and places. Now it’s time for Belgium. For Belgium we went to Antwerpen-Brussels and Brugge. I only visited Brussels before and according to my memory Brussels was nice back then but now it wasn’t impressive at all, not that I disappointed it just showed me what 10 years could do to a city 😉
For Antwerpen, the train station was IMPRESSIVE ! It’s an old station but so so stunning in a way that only the building itself is able to mesmerized me. We stayed in a boutique hotel called Hotel Diamond and Pearls, it was about 30-40 mins by Taxi from the station, no elevator people! because it was such a heritage building and when they built it, the elevator doesn’t even exist-at least that’s what the GM told me.
Jason is super funny! He’s so cute and helpful, he recommended the place to eat and place to visit with a very clear explanation, he said “everything is so close, to go to Friday market its only take 2 minutes” btw it’s only the name Friday market but they have it every day 😉 and I said “Yeah, 2 minutes according to your pace but my pace could be slower” and he followed “no, it’s only right-left-right and you’re there” and it was literally just there, we came back to Jason to asked if we were on the right Friday market place and he said “yeah you found it, just like I said”
Then there is a place called Big market which is bigger than the Friday market but still close by, there’s also another place that looked like either a fort or Hogwarts school called Steelplein but unfortunately it’s under construction so we cannot go there 🙁
We also visited many churches, at least there are 2 churches in this area. I saw the coolest church every which they have a “fitness” corner haha!
Besides the kind of city center area, there is also a Tunnel for Antwerpen people or so to cross the river to the other side, it’s called Sint Anne tunnel where we went at least 30 meter below and what is so special about this? It’s the escalator! Jason called it a moving stairs hahaha 😉 that made out of wood and he said it’s pretty cool place to visit just to see the escalator and we trusted him so we went just to hop on on this very special wooden escalator, we didn’t even bother to cross the tunnel as Jason said it will take 20-30 mins to go to the other side.
Finished with Antwerpen, we went on to Brussels and to my surprise Brussels are dirty 🙁 but yeah here we are, let’s made the best out of it, waffles! churros! and the peeing boy-manneken pis. As far as I know there is only a boy but there’s also a girl and a dog! We went to the girl but it’s rather creepy and better not see it and the dog, meh! we didn’t even bother to search it.
Here is the famous manneken pis!
Ooops! he’s a boy so he’s not big and tall hahaha and def he’s not peeing while holding a waffle or peeing to the waffle hey kid! behave! here is the real one 😉
So…to whom who think the famous peeing statue is big… no oh! wrong! hahaha it’s really small. At least, the town hall is good!
Another famous attraction in Brussels is the Atomium, still have no idea why this could be it hahahaha there’s Mini Europe there so it’s the miniature of the whole building in Europe. Imo, it’s not necessary, even if you have time, you won’t miss anything if you missed it. If I may, better go to Brugge or even stay there for 3 days and visited Brussels for one day that would be the smart plan! Brugge is like 40-50mins away by train from Brussels but once you step in there…it’s a fairy tale land! I love it instantly, my sister booked a walking tour for 2.5 hours from Legend walking tour, our tour guide a 68 years old named Louis is a very nice guy and he also recommend a very nice restaurant, even until my Europe trip finished, no restaurant can beat the food we had in Brugge! He said he also do night tour where they go to a spooky, urban legend kind of place with torches and stuff and that’s sounds so appealing!
He said there are only 2 homeless guy in Brugge and they were put on a nice old house which many stuff enough for their daily needs and when I heard it it’s so nice that Brugge does it to their people. As someone who loves and believe in fairy tale haha #shy, and fast forward few years after that I could see these building that I only imagine exist in the fairy tale land in real life, I was amazed by it.
He also said that only in Brugge they have a pipe line for beer! So that the truck doesn’t need to do the unloading and pass through the city center as it would damage the streets.
Owh how I can’t get enough of Brugge #eyes drooling 🙂 we also went to churches and the town hall.
Cheers to the very satisfying dinner we had in Brugge 🙂
I think the saying of “Good Things Come In Small Package” does exist as Brugge and Antwerpen is smaller compare to Brussels but they do have better things here! At first I thought the saying was “Big Things Come In Small Package” but someone told me that it’s not true because if it’s big things then how can it fits in the small package? hahaha so we searched it on the internet and turns out indeed he was right, not big things but good things 😉
After that we went back to Brussels as we will leave the next day to the city of light and love, Paris! …stay tuned 😉