Brussels and Brugge Belgium

If you like the smooth, creamy chocolate, fresh homemade waffles, horse drawn carriage rides, quaint European cobblestone courtyards, and picturesque canals laden with old style bridges meandering through cities, then you might want to head to Brugge Belgium for a couple of days.  The epitome of all of the above!  Brugge did not disappoint for a quick weekend get away with our favorite people the Johnsons.  This time we left all 11 kids behind and walked away from the weekend wondering why we don’t do that more often?  It was heavenly.  No strollers, sharing food, or staying in cheap hotels.  We were pampered on this trip! 

Before we headed to BRUGGE (sounds like rouge like on your cheeks), we stayed a night and spent the morning in Brussels Belgium.  Our hotel was a big hit with fabulous rooms and an amazing breakfast.  Lisa and I loved this cute bench chair that was in the lobby: 

The highlights of Brussels are the main courtyard, waffles, and the peeing boy statue…..I know, I know just bare with me.  Our weather was “ify” when we woke up having rained most of the night, but once we were out and touring, it wasn’t too bad.  Europe had a very rainy FALL this year. 

 

So after browsing several chocolate shops and drooling I mean admiring through the store front windows, we went into this store and got a bag to go! 

Then we had to get a waffle, and Oh man was it a waffle.  The gave us the flimsiest forks to eat these with (no knife) and a napkin each.  I think it’s a little joke they play on tourists to see how long it takes them to come back down stairs to scrounge around for more eating provisions ‘cuz man was this a skill (trying to eat with out wearing).  And yes they tasted as amazing as they look! 

I found this history on line of the Peeing Boy statue: or THE Mannekin Pis as he is officially titled.  Hey I just report what we saw sorry for the gutter talk:  

Upon arrival in Brussels the first attraction you are shown is definitely the Manneken Pis (little pee man in Flemish). Located close to the Grand Place on rue de l’Etuve 31 (Lievevrouwbroersstraat 31, 1000 Brussels, Belgium) he stands at just 61cm (24 inches). The peeing boy is a tiny bronze fountain statue. One would not normally call this art piece ‘majestic’, but the locals have so many stories and ways of celebrating festivals with the little peeing boy that even the toughest critic would leave with fondness for the bronze doll.

Stories of Manneken Pis
Many great legends bring this little statue to life in the hearts of visitors, and the question is why was this statue erected? One story tells of a tourist father who lost his son in the city and after receiving help from villagers to find the boy, he gifted this statue to them. Another, more daring, tale is one where the boy was a spy during a siege of the city. He literally put out a ploy to bomb the city by urinating on the explosives! Many stories such as this have given the Mannekin Pis a firm place in Brussels’ city-life but none would compete with its present-day glory.

Celebrations with the Manneken Pis
The people of Brussels don’t simply look upon the cute statuette and show it to tourists. The Manneken Pis plays a full part in the city’s annual calendar and even has an outfit for every occasion. Manneken Pis’ wardrobe ranges from Santa suits to national costumes from countries around the world. The most recent addition is a red leather Chinese costume presented by the city of Haining, China. On special occasions, brass-bands would play and Manneken Pis would be hooked up to different flavours of Belgian beer, which is poured from his fountain tip and given out to the public. With such love and care for the Manneken, who needs Big Ben?

 

I was kinda shocked at the size of the entire statue.  For as much as they worship this little guy, you’d think he was gonna be as big as Lady Liberty.  Yes….we saw many replicas of the little man before seeing the actual one….he is everywhere!  Even in color. 

So after the statue….we hopped in the car and headed straight for Brugge.  Many different people told us to not spend much time in Brussels, but to hurry to BRUGGE.  Thankfully we listened because Brugge was AWESOME! 

  

This is where we ate for dinner:  A Rick Steve’s recommendation……yum!  Chris and Jared got Flemish Stew that they will probably talk about for decades…..it was pretty good! 

    

Brugge’s main courtyard is cool too.  We climbed this bell tower below which revealed this bird’s eye view:

 

Next we had to find DUMON Chocolate which was a recommendation from Ms. Rebecca….wow was it awesome!  And this shop was so cute and quaint.  They have two other Dumon Chocolate shops in town that are fancy and modern, but this one was quaint and cheaper.  So we bought some and as we were leaving said, “oh we might be back”.  The lady behind the counter said, “oh you will be back, everyone comes back”!   And she was right.  We went back 2 or 3 times before feeling like we had enough! 

 

Next we tried out the horse drawn carriage rides:  so cool! 

They let us out for a bit to explore some older parts of town before taking us back to the main courtyard. 

We spent the rest of the afternoon wandering around this amazing warf.  The next morning we took a boat ride through the canals of Brugge, since our Segway tour got canceled on account of rain.  This little warf area was very cool! A fun last way to see all the sights in Brugge.