Region de Bruxelles-Capitale Travel Blogs, Travelogues and Travel Journals - Page 8

We had 4 days in Belgium, the first two of which were in Brussels.  If you don’t know, Brussels is the capital of Belgium and also the capital of the EU, so it is largely set up for the mechanics of government.  However, it’s a major tourist destination and there are dozens of chocolate shops, seafood restaurants, and historic buildings and museums as well.  Oh, and they like 80s music, particularly Genesis.  I’ll mention the hotel we stayed in purely because …

In almost a month I covered Belgium, the Netherlands, France and Spain visiting Brussels, the old city of Brugge, explored the beaches af Normandy right in time for the 50th anniversary of D-Day and enjoyed the parties of Barcelona.

Brussels From Luxembourg we started for Brussels in a train. At Luxembourg station we bought the tickets at 9:27 am for a train leaving at 9:29 am and ran like hell. Made it just in time. A Belgian friend in Aalborg had already warned us that trains are not so regular in his country and true to his word the train journey of hours took a good 45 mins extra. Welcome to the city of Eurocrats, plenty of chocolate fountains, an array of waffles and more than 200 kinds of beers • Brussels…

I tell you, when we came to Brussels we thought it was a garbage city. There was garbage all over on the streets. So we where kinda scared we where ended up in a bad neighborhood. But the next morning everything was clean and ok, so maybe the city had some kind of cleaning day when we did arrive?

Europe Trip in September 2003

Last night didn’t get much better. I was woken up at 2am because one of the students fell on glass at a bar and ended up in the hospital. He is fine, and even made it to class. I took the afternoon and went to Brussels. Its only an hour from here by train. I had been to Brussels when I was in high school for one night. I didn’t really remember much about it, so I thought it would be a good day trip. I went to the Atomium, a leftover from the 1958 World’s Fair. It’s a 300 foo…

Wow, it was a shock for 12 of us getting off the plane in Brussels, we weren't prepared for the blast of cold air that hit us.  Or the fact that it was still dark at 8am.  We said goodbye to 1/2 our group who were staying in Brussels.  The rest of us waundered the airport.  We got in about 0530 and I spent $12 on breakfast, which was a muffin, fresh fruit and a bottle of water.  Did some window shopping, nothing was open yet.  Then spent the rest of the time…

Arriving in the afternoon in Brussels, I managed to whirl through most of the major sights, and actually thought they looked prettier at night lit up dramatically. Everything was big, square and imposing, though beautiful in it's own ways, it was a testimony to size. The streets were all cobbled in the tourist area, but it wasn't as pretty as Bruges. Lots of quirky things in Brussels, including strange signs (Claustrophobis - the clothing store) and strange sights (The War on Terror - th…

My journey by rail through central Europe. 25.12.2006-07.01.2007

In a perfect world with no flight cancellations or delays, and where someone could hop from plane to plane within 15 minutes, how many countries can a person visit in the shortest possible time? Here's one possibility using July 2006 timetables.

So Brussels is in the French speaking part of Belgium, which I didn't realize until I got there. Hell I didn't even know I was going there until 3 days ago. I flew from Belfast to London (yes, I went back to Ireland, I just can't get enough!) and then from London to Brussels. And being the cheapskate that I am I booked the 2 legs of the flight from 2 different airlines and had to wait in the London airport for 12 hours, and got kicked out of a cafe for sleeping on their bench :( Anyway... so…

Brussels was a very small city, totally see-able in 1 day. Just hit the major sites around the old town.  Before we headed over to the Grand Place, we had to try a belgium waffle. The waffle was good, I should have splurged a little and added some toppings. We walked to the Grand Place and the buildings were quite magnificent.  There seemed to be a stage set up for a concert that night, which totally blocked my pictures. After gawking at the Grand Place, we went to look for the Mann…

I had been trying to get a business deal in Brussels closed for the past couple of days so that I could head down to Lisbon to meet a colleague there on another matter.  I finally got the signatures I needed on the contract, so was able to catch a noon flight on TAP Air Portugal to Lisbon.  It's a two and a half hour flight to Lisbon.  The plane was a fairly new Airbus so it was quite nice.  I was originally on the standby list, but I cleared at the last minute a…

I have been working in Brussels for the last few days trying to get some deals closed before the end of the week.  Today one of my co-workers and I drove to a meeting in Breda in the Netherlands to try to finish up one matter.  We got back to Brussels around 4:30pm, and I worked until 7 when I had to go pick up another co-worker at the Brussels Airport.  We had a great dinner that night at the Belga Queen (reviewed below).

Here are some of the places i've been. If you've got any questions feel free to ask, or if you have any suggestions of what to see next let me know! I'm brainstorming for trips in 2008.