"The entire historical centre is an open-air museum" this is how Bruges is described in my guidebook. The best way to enjoy it is to forget about attractions, wander, and soak in the atmosphere. Free of schedules, I did all-day chocolate shopping, post-card writing, tower-climbing, canal-cruising, while accompanied by a lovely French lady!
Itinerary of the day: Béguinage → Onze Lieve Vrouwekerk → The Old Chocolate House → Mary Chocolatier → 2b Beer Wall → Chocolatier Van Oost → Galler → Grote Markt → Belfry → canal cruise
What I've known about Bruges was entirely from Age of Discoveries (lol no shame), and it being a former major trading port. It was part of Hanseatic League and functioned as its major connection point to the south (lace was one of the iconic trading items). Before this golden age, it traded with England and Scandinavia. Since the 16th century its major functioning channel, Zwin, started to silt, The city's importance as a commercial centre soon got replaced by Antwerp.
Couple hundred years later, Bruges was revamped to become a popular tourist destination. It's great in a way that the historical center has been preserved to be the same layout as it was in the 16th century.
Breakfast in our hotel is self-serve, so after comfortably sleeping till 9:00, I headed to Carrefour Express to pick up some food items.
Immediately saw a wall of Galler. Of course I have done my research regarding what brands of chocolates to buy in Belgium, and Galler is one brand claimed to be made from "natural ingredients" and yet reasonably priced.
Another brand that can easily be bought at a supermarket is the Côte d'Or. This is the chocolate for stingy backpackers who wants good chocolates for cheap. Having tasted both by now, Galler tastes better, has more interesting flavours to choose from and probably make a nicer gift for others, but both are great to hoard for yourself!
Self-serve breakfast can be pretty awesome, though at this time I had no idea that ham was going to cause me a tragedy later on...
Today I have arranged to meet up with an old friend from the Hetalia fandom, whose username was "Weirdpika" when I first met her on Livejournal. Even though we don't talk about the fandom anymore, we kept in touch and she's like a sister I have in France. If it means anything, she was the first person to send me a screaming message when Hetalia Netherlands first made an appearance. Time flies! This will be the first time we meet in person after three years, and in a country not our own!
We met up at the tourist information center and she "recognize me right away because of my big camera".
We first visited Béguinage, a UNESCO heritage site. These complex of buildings are scattered throughout the Flemish cultural region. They were initiated by women in the 13th century who wanted to practice their religion but do no want to entirely withdrawn from society as traditional catholic nuns do. They had formed a community that functions to meet their spiritual and basic living needs. These women, many unmarried or widowed, devoted time to prayers and charity, but still work and had their own wealth possessions.
My friend who went off to explore Bruges on her own for the day, said she spotted nuns still living here.
It was breeding season for birds, so a horde of giant swans were building their nests outside of Béguinage. Think they're cute? I know how vicious swans can be...
Next we check out Onze Lieve Vrouwekerk (Church of Our Lady - yeah the names just keep repeating themselves), mainly for Michelangelo's Madonna and Child. This is the only work by him that left Italy. When we got there though, the church was under renovation and free to enter, and we couldn't find the sculpture. We left thinking that it was not available for viewing at this time.
Later in the day my friend revealed that you have to pay 2 Euros to see the section of the church with the sculpture. It's a little bit disappointing to miss Mike's work, but here's a photo of it taken by my friend.
We had lunch at The Old Chocolate House as per Weirdpika's recommendation. She said the hot-chocolate here is very good, and the chocolate house itself seemed to agree:
Unlike the cheap powdered version of what I've known hot chocolates to be, here you get the proper chocolate pellets to dissolve in hot milk. I've never had white hot chocolate before so I was excited to try it!
The cup was the size of my head and I couldn't finish it! The hot chocolate was really rich and sweet, which I'm not a big fan of, but perhaps people with a sweet tooth might like this.
We also ordered waffle (more like a pancake...) which I wasn't too impressed with either, and they charged extra for sharing. The food didn't blow me away, but it was a great time spent with good company and writing postcards to loved ones.
In most resources I've read, Brussels is the place to shop for chocolates, but I figured I should do it in Bruges since we got a busy day planned in Brussels. Our first stop was Mary Chocolatier.
(Photo posted with permission)
In all the brands I've bought on this trip, this is definitely the best. Make sure you get something from them if you ever go to Brussels or Bruges! Don't be intimidated by the fancy decor, the lady storekeeper was so friendly and even gave us free samples. The chocolates are delicate, refined and sophisticated, with a hint of sweetness but full of artisanal merit. Packaging is minimalist with a splash of femininity, and I would recommend this to be a gift for moms, significant others and best friends (+hoarding for yourself).
I especially recommend their Earl Grey flavour, I don't even like the tea but looooove the chocolate!
A trip to Belgium is not complete until you pay some homage to beer. Weirdpika brought me to a "beer wall" at 2b that she visited when she was in Bruges two year ago. All that Belgian beer and their corresponding glasses/cups!
Next chocolate shop was chocolatier Van Oost. This is not a very widely discussed chocolatier, and I only walked in because I remember someone on TA highly recommended it. This jiji in the photo however, was not willing to communicate in English XD. Good thing I have a French person with me to help me pick out multiple flavours to fill up a 500g box. I brought this box to my coworkers and it was gone within a few hours...I only got to try one, and it was really good! They seemed to do pralines really well.
More Galler! Even though I already bought some bars at Carrefour this morning, The boutique has assorted batons and tablets in fancier packaging.
Bruges' Grote Markt has some very cute and colourful facades, but I find it hard to enjoy from this angle with all the tourist buses passing by.
The best view of the Grote Markt is actually to be seen from Belfry. The photo at the beginning of this trip report is the Grote Markt seen from about two-thirds of the way to the top.
366 steps later we got a nice view over Bruges. These photos are a bit deceiving because there are webbed wires at the top, and these are taken through the wires with a tele lens.
We then mailed out the postcards at the post office on Grote Markt. Weirdpika helped me buy stamps with the selfpost machine, and it only takes credit cards. What is with Belgium and Netherlands and their limited paying options? Why are you making life difficult for tourists, don't you want our money?
Their postal system is hella efficient though - recipients of these cards told me they got the cards in as short as two days!
Before Weirdpika heads back to France, we decided to squeeze in a 30-minutes canal cruise ride.
Thank you sooooo much Weirdpika for driving all the way up here, and teaching me how to properly do faire la bise (bisoux bisoux <3). It's so great to have a local (sort of) to translate things and give me a different point of view, which is a luxury that I don't always get when I'm traveling. It was a such a great day!
and thanks for recommending Jules Destrooper! All these sweets I bought goes extremely well with Mariage Frères tea you gave me.
This is the result of my 100€ worth of chocolate shopping spree.
After trying out all these brands (I also bought Neuhaus and Dolfin later on), the conclusion is that you can't really go wrong with buying chocolates in Belgium...it all comes to down to personal taste as to which one is "the best". For example I really dislike Godiva, so even though a bunch of people recommended it, I'm not even going to bother. Especially if you grow up with overly sweetened and oiled-up North American chocolate bars, or Asian chocolates that are filled with gel-like chemical additives, you will most likely be very impressed by Belgian chocolates!
After reuniting my friend, who also had a great day wandering about Bruges on her own, we headed out to Gran Kaffee de Passage for dinner.
It's just weird to leave Belgium without trying flavoured beer! Even my friend who doesn't drink ordered a glass. Hers is the Framboise and mine is the typical Kriek. I really liked the kriek, it doesn't have the bitter aftertaste that most beers have, and tasted more like some kind of soda. Her strawberry beer is gross though...tasted like cough syrup.
My friend ordered spare ribs, which is the restaurant specialty and also a common item in Belgian cuisine (can someone confirm this?)? I'll be honest, it tasted very Chinese to me. The house sauce is so very sweet and sour soy sauce! The ribs were good but it felt odd to fly all the way here and have food that tasted Chinese. Reminded me of that time when I ordered Lomo saltado in Peru...
I ordered Filet Americaine, which is a Belgian version of steak tartare. Beef tartare can be found in many cuisines, so the Belgian part of this is the fries, and the herbs and onions mixed in the meat. It was really good, but I'm still finding it difficult to pinpoint what Belgian food (that's not desserts) is...
Tomorrow we leave the adorable Bruges and head to Brussels!
