Country hopping -- today's episode: Brussels
There are many things I don't like about living in Europe. Being super close to other fascinating cities is definitely one of the advantages, though. I think it was on Wednesday that I decided that I wanted to go to Brussels for the weekend -- I had been feeling rather... uh... let's say poorly (*sigh*) for a number of days (and reasons) and the next couple of weekends would be rather busy, so it seemed like the perfect time to go away. Luckily knile was up for it, so Saturday morning we hit the train. Would you believe that Brussels is just under three hours away?
We had a long-ish layover in Roosendaal, the sleepiness of which bordered hilarity. There was just... nothing. I guess that's the deal with many border towns.
The short ride to Brussels was surprisingly entertaining, mainly because of a couple of Spring break-y Americans. One of them was sitting sleeping right in front of us and looked apparently rather stoned and/or sleepy -- not cool if you're crossing the border from the Netherlands to Belgium. (Which struck me as weird because I was definitely never even passport-checked whenever I go to Germany.)
In Brussels we went to a bunch of museums, had lots of beer and fried food and generally a great time. (Minus my stomach (liver?) being very upset with me for trying to kill it with booze and grease. Tough luck, internal organs -- you better get used to it.)
Grand Place / Grote Markt
Yummy waffle with speculoos spread!
Manneken Pis ;)
Random sighting of Tintin :)
Mussles and beer! (And of course some French Belgian fries in the back.)
It took us a ridiculously long time to find these comic strip murals.
The Atomium! We didn't go inside because it was late and not all that cheap but it looked pretty impressive!
Brussels has a quite effective metro system, something I really miss in Nijmegen.
We hit a comic book store and I got myself a couple of my favorite books. I started reading Mafalda when I was... uh... six or seven and I haven't stopped loving her ever since.
In unrelated news, my little greenhouse is doing great! Friday morning I had already seen something white sticking out of the soil but my camera failed me. Then on Saturday morning I was in too much of a rush to take a picture.
But this is what the little guys look like now:
I'm supposed to put them in separate pots once they have four leaves. Let's hope that won't happen before the weekend because I don't really have time to do any sort of gardening supplies shopping. Nobody told me things would happen so fast. ;)
We had a long-ish layover in Roosendaal, the sleepiness of which bordered hilarity. There was just... nothing. I guess that's the deal with many border towns.
The short ride to Brussels was surprisingly entertaining, mainly because of a couple of Spring break-y Americans. One of them was sitting sleeping right in front of us and looked apparently rather stoned and/or sleepy -- not cool if you're crossing the border from the Netherlands to Belgium. (Which struck me as weird because I was definitely never even passport-checked whenever I go to Germany.)
In Brussels we went to a bunch of museums, had lots of beer and fried food and generally a great time. (Minus my stomach (liver?) being very upset with me for trying to kill it with booze and grease. Tough luck, internal organs -- you better get used to it.)
Grand Place / Grote Markt
Yummy waffle with speculoos spread!
Manneken Pis ;)
Random sighting of Tintin :)
Mussles and beer! (And of course some French Belgian fries in the back.)
It took us a ridiculously long time to find these comic strip murals.
The Atomium! We didn't go inside because it was late and not all that cheap but it looked pretty impressive!
Brussels has a quite effective metro system, something I really miss in Nijmegen.
We hit a comic book store and I got myself a couple of my favorite books. I started reading Mafalda when I was... uh... six or seven and I haven't stopped loving her ever since.
In unrelated news, my little greenhouse is doing great! Friday morning I had already seen something white sticking out of the soil but my camera failed me. Then on Saturday morning I was in too much of a rush to take a picture.
But this is what the little guys look like now:
I'm supposed to put them in separate pots once they have four leaves. Let's hope that won't happen before the weekend because I don't really have time to do any sort of gardening supplies shopping. Nobody told me things would happen so fast. ;)