Brussels

Town Hall in the Grand Place

We arrived in Brussels on a Saturday afternoon in time to see the Grand Place alive with people, a small market, cafes, and shops.  We spent the evening meandering through the narrow streets lined with waffle stands, chocolate shops, beer, pomme frites, and mussels.  It was a little overwhelming at first, the whole city seemed like a glutton's paradise, and everything kind of looked the same so we felt a little lost at times, or like we were having déjà vu walking through the streets – were we just on this street or is this a new street with delicious things everywhere?  

Buy one of these sticks with your choice of chocolate, and you get a cup of hot milk to make your own hot chocolate.

We made our way to the famous sculpture Manneken Pis, and it lived up to it’s very low expectations, I think Lilah may have been bigger than the little peeing man.  We encountered some very drunk older men in suits – one of them fell on Wilson, another was lying in the middle of the street (and we are pretty sure we saw an ambulance headed his way), and a third one was dancing with every women he encountered at a very crowded bar while knocking himself and his dancing partner into tables and patrons.  There is something about seeing completely obliterated 50+-year-old well-dressed men that is just hilarious.   

Mannekin Pis

We spent a few hours at a bar called Delerium Tremens (this wasn’t actually a Huyghe Brewery bar, but Chris was still very excited to be in the land of the Delierum Tremens), and enjoyed some Belgian beers we’d never tried before.  We made friends with two French guys who lent us their Yahtzee set and then ended up gifting it to us before we left.  Lilah was a great sport, she seems to really love being in new places and people watching – which is great for us! 

Typical street view

On Sunday we met up with our friend Stef for the day – she is Dutch, we met her while we were all living in Honduras.  We overlapped in Europe for a few weeks before she moved to Australia so Brussels was a good half-way point for a quick rendez-vous before she left.  We had a pretty authentic Belgium lunch at Fin de Siecle, which had a great atmosphere with good beers and excellent food (Chris and Stef had sausages and stoemp, and I had carbonade flamande), and then went to check out another area of the city, home to Mini-Europe and the Atomium.  I think Europeans have a thing for mini things, we've heard of a Mini-France, and now this. The idea is that you can walk through a scale model of the whole continent, and see all the main attractions of every country.  But it was was closed, so we turned around and headed to a very NON-mini molecule looming on the horizon.

The Atomium (should be called The Molleculem)

The Atomium was built during the World's Fair of 1958, and is composed of multiple silver spherical rooms, connected by diagonal stair-wells in the shape of a molecule. After buying our tickets for the observation deck in the top atom (102 meters up) we discovered that we'd have to wait in an hour-long line for the elevator. So we opted to go through the ‘museum’ of the Atomium instead, which gets you up into a few of the lower pods.  The exhibits were terrible (dusty dated history exhibit), and this place should never be visited by anyone.  If you ever find yourself in Brussels, just enjoy the Atomium from the outside, but don’t waste your time going here!  Regardless, we had a very fun and hilarious day exploring with Stef.

Thanks for meeting us for a long lunch!

Brouwerji Huyghe - Belgium

A couple weeks ago the whole family piled into a tiny rental car and and drove to Brussels, Belgium. The EU has open borders between their countries, so we drove right through the border crossing which had fallen into a state of disrepair and resembled an apocalyptic stronghold. We took a wrong turn, which would have been potentially disastrous due to road-signs being in a strange language and a data plan restricted to France, but miraculously we wound up on the right street and drove straight into Ghent. Apparently the medieval city/castles of Ghent are a popular tourist destination but we didn't know this, and besides we weren't here for culture, we were here for beer.

Huyghe Brewery

Ghent (well technically Melle) is home to Brouwerji Huyghe where they brew Delirium Tremens, one of my favorite beers (the best beer in the world actually). It is a tripel, a strong champagne-like beer with a very mild fruitiness rounded out with a golden warmth. I think it has been getting popular in the US in the last few years; I seem to spot the pink elephant at more and more beer venues. We donned hairnets and began our tour, and were a little surprised when the tour ended up being in Flemish. So we didn't get much information, but now and then the guide would step aside and give us some explanations in broken English. We saw the copper stills, a complex filtration system, the bottling plant, and the warehouse. There were stacks upon stacks of creates headed all over the world.

Lilah is very embarrassed by her mother.

bottling plant

Then the tour came to an end, and the real fun began... beer tasting. For the 7-euro tour admission we got unlimited beer pours from a trio of adorable Belgians. We were probably there for 2 hours and no one was rushing us out. They even filled up a giant, over-sized Delirium Tremens chalice for a guy dressed up in a lion costume on his bachelor party. We tried all the beers on tap, and both decided that La Guillotine was actually a far superior beer to Delirium Tremens. Also on tap was a Floris Kreik cherry beer, which Kimmy really enjoyed. The bartender saw this and took it as his cue to open up the private reserves hidden in a fridge behind the bar. He brought out an assortment of fruit beers (Floris & gluten free Mongozo), ranging from mango, apple, raspberry, honey, and passion fruit. We even enjoyed a coconut beer out of a coconut shell. Bizarre! This treatment solidified my opinion that Delirium Tremens is the best.

Apparently it was completely normal for the Bachelor to be wearing a fur suit.

I love my drinking partner (She's holding a draft cherry beer that wasn't sweet)

The Bar... the best, sorry I didn't get the bartenders to pose.

Lilah absolutely loves coasters. It gives us a solid 15 minutes of freedom.

Coconut beer might sound gross, but I thought it was great. I mean there is a time and place for coconut beer... but it worked here.

Le Petit Parisien

On Sunday we got a guided tour of Paris with our friend Adrien. Chris met him at an insect chemical ecology course that he took in Sweden 4 years ago.  As we were snapping photos (and likely embarrassing him with our touristy ways) we came across this little restaurant and made him pose under it's sign.  We all giggled a little because Adrien towers over me and Chris.

We asked Adrien to take us to some of his favorite places, and to just be our guide - we've been making so many decisions lately, so it was nice to have a break from planning!  We met him at one of the Northern-most metro stops, in the Montmartre District.  Getting around Paris, specifically the metro, with our stroller is sometimes a pain so we decided that we would try carrying Lilah in the Ergo (baby back/front-pack) for the day.  Good thing we did, because first stop on our tour was Sacre-Coeur (Sacred Heart Cathedral), which is located at the top of a huge hill.  The walk up to the Cathedral was awesome in itself - the steps were filled with people and street performers.

This guy scaled the lamp post with his basketball balanced on his head.

Half way to the top overlooking Paris

Sacred Heart Cathedral

After walking through the inside of the cathedral and rubbing elbows with french nuns, we meandered our way through the neighborhood of Montmatre, eventually ending up at Moulin Rouge. This is the neighborhood that once was home to Picasso, Vlamenck, Derain, Soutine, Modigliani, Van Gogh, and Hemmingway. The narrow cobblestone streets are picturesque, but it has become commercialized, and it is hard to imagine modern Picasso's hanging out here. But among the watercolors and caricaturists inhabiting this outdoor painter's square, Place de Tertre, there might hang a masterpiece...

Could it be? A Bansky?

Want to buy some art from this guy?

It's so small in real life!

Then we took the metro to Le Jardin Des Plantes, and walked around there for awhile.  There is a zoo located within the garden, and some of the animals are visible without going into the zoo.  We got to see Chris' favorite creature, the red panda!  Afterwards we went to dinner at a restaurant that specializes in Pommes Aligot... cheesy garlicy mashed potatoes.  Yum!

These are mashed potatoes!

Thanks for the fun day, Adrien!

The Palace of Versailles

We kind of stumbled upon the Palace of Verasilles on Saturday.  Our plan for the day was to go to Chartres Cathedral, a medieval cathedral about an hour outside of Paris.  We wanted an inexpensive and non-Paris adventure, and the tour books and websites we consulted guaranteed this.  Chris did some research and figured out the train to get there and what to do in the area aside from the cathedral itself.  We took the RER by our house to the big train station in Versailles, where we needed to catch the train to Chartres.  When we went to buy train tickets to Chartres, we were shocked to find out that round-trip tickets for 2 on this commuter train were €56 (roughly $75).  Since we weren't particularly excited about this specific cathedral (it just sounded like a nice adventure for a Saturday), we decided to scrap that idea and head to the Palace of Versailles for the day instead since we were only about a 10 minute walk away.  Rough choice, I know.

I am not a history buff, and I had planned to do some research on French History and all of the Louis' prior to visiting the Palace, but that obviously didn't happen.  Aside from seeing pictures of the Palace and seeing it in movies, I wasn't really sure what to expect.  It's hard to describe the magnitude of the Palace, but it is enormous.  We learned that in it's prime, the palace was like a big city, home to 10,000 people.  No wonder it's so big.

Entering the Palace

After touring the main area of the palace (with the hall of mirrors, king and queen's chambers, cathedral, etc), we went into the Apartments where some of the daughters of Louis XV lived.  The U-shaped building is comprised of two symmetrical apartments with a total of 10 rooms, that escalate from biggest to smallest as you go in towards the center of the U.  Each side of the apartment had two antechambers (basically big rooms for entertaining visitors), a drawing (music) room, a bed chamber, and a study.  This was probably our favorite part of the tour, it was less crowded and we got to see more of how the families actually lived. They didn't live very private lives, as there were dozens of lesser nobles to witness, and actively participate in, their waking in the morning, and tucking-in at night. Each room of the apartments were used to host events every day, with the more interior ones being restricted to higher ranking guests, while anyone could enter the 1st antechamber.

Marie Antoinette's Interior (Bed) Chamber

Chris in the Hall of Mirrors

Organ in the music chamber of Madame Adelaide's apartment (the greyhounds on top mean it is an organ for women).

We didn't check out the gardens during this visit - it was rainy, and we'll be back with a picnic next time.  We did eat some crepes and hit up the local market where we bought mussels, wine, veggies, and bread for dinner.

Wilson found some woods!

To Wilson's surprise there is a forest right across the main street from our house. This is a huge necessity for the likes of Wilson. He is a strapping young pup with loads of energy and so he needs a regular session of off-leash running. Without it, he sometimes just runs circles in the backyard until he runs out of breath.

Our house is in the big red circle in the upper right. Entrance to park is the little red circle. Downtown is under the name "Orsay"

It has be a little rainy lately, but with our boots on, hiking through it is a pleasure. We pass by other couples, and leash-less dogs. Everyone fawns over Lilah. There might even be a way to hike through this to get to town. A path leads under the highway and up to a bluff overlooking the city. Downtown Orsay is located along the banks of a little river and these woods mount the south side of the valley.

Lilah mesmerized by the leaf-less trees against the sky.

Peek-a-boo

We are looking forward to the spring, when the woods will drastically shift in appearance.

Sunset

Lilah month-by-month

Our sweet baby girl is 6 months old already!  To celebrate her half birthday we put together her monthly sticker shoot to-date.  She gets cuter and more fun every day, we love watching her grow and change.  And that smile...  

Our First Trip to Paris

We've been talking about moving to Paris for so long. And we've been planning all the steps involved in making that move come to fruition. But we have spent zero time actually planning what to do while in Paris. Truthfully, Kimmy and I know very little about France. So when we set out to "do" Paris one random weekday, we really weren't sure what it is that we were going to "do". So instead of getting overwhelmed with tour books, schedules, museum passes, and reservations, we just decided to keep it simple: Take the metro to the Eiffel Tower and just walk towards whatever nearby attraction reared its head.

A 10 minute walk from our house is a "RER B" station. I guess the RER is equivalent to Chicago's Metra, in that it stretches from the heart of the city out to all the nearby suburbs. We take RER B into the city and transfer to the metro. The tiled tunnels of the metro are clearly marked with metro lines and directions, so it's actually pretty easy to navigate. We get off at Bir-Hakeim (Tour Eiffel) and our anticipation grows. We are fully embracing the tourist obsession with the Eiffel Tower. We walk around a corner and Kimmy squeals.

It is pretty thrilling being in the presence of such an iconic monument such as this, so we have a good time just walking around the gardens surrounding the tower. There's a ginormous line to get to the top and so we move on and walk towards the Arc de Triomphe. But we're a little hungry. We don't have a guide book or a cellular data plan so we just walk up interesting looking streets and find a very authentic Tapas restaurant. 

I do have a really good offline map app called City Maps 2Go Pro. This map is a great tool for travelling because without the fear of getting lost you really can delve into the twisted back alleys of a city and really get an authentic experience. You download the maps when you have wifi, and then just use the phone's free gps abilities to move around through the map. The map also has addresses and (I am now realizing) a lot of businesses names, so you can search for things.  

We hear Paris is know for its fine international cuisine, so we don't feel too bad that our first restaurant in Paris is non-French. Plus it was really good. 

Next time I'm getting some of this shaved off

three little paella squidlingtons

We gorge on paella and giant capers and head back out to arrive at the monument to French military victories. It's huge!

Kimmy & Lilah dwarfed by a relief on the Arc de Triomphe

Detail on the Arc's ceiling

Several major streets radiate out from the Arc, we follow Champs-Elysees (The "magnificent mile" of Paris) down through Jardin des Tulleries (A huge garden), and to the Louvre. We pass inumerable amounts of attractions along the way, but for now we just walk and look. The architecture is obviously beautiful, and the open, large avenue aesthetic feels very royal.  On our walk we stop in a random British pub for a pint.

Some pictures along the way.

We then cross the Seine river, and enter a little island holding Sainte-Chapelle and Notre Dame Cathedral. On one of the blocks was a street bird market. Yep only birds. Cages upon cages of song birds tweeting away as, in timely fashion, the hunch-back of Notre Dame rings his bells.

Back on the mainland we take a break in a cafe as night fell. I'm drinking coffee now and it is delicious! After the cafe we walk around the Pantheon and find the Latin Quarter. I think this is supposed to be an international quarter and a university neighborhood. The street we find is literally lined with French/Fondue restaurants and crepe stands. We walk the entire length twice before choosing one, and have our first French dinner. Variations on Boeuf et Beurre!

Before ducking down into the metro to find our way home, the Eiffel waves goodbye with a spotlight and sparkles