Brussels, The Center of the EU

We’re staying in Ghent because it’s only a 30-minute train ride to both Brussels and Bruges, two places we want to visit. Great plan, right? Oh….not so much. But more about that later. First, here’s a picture from one of our balconies I took last night.

Second, a friend from Robson Ranch uploaded a great video to YouTube about our community. I’ve asked Peter more than once on our trip if he misses home and he very quickly replies….”Nope”. While I miss my friends, I don’t really miss home either. Well, at least I didn’t until I saw Sam’s video, now I miss it terribly. Thanks so much Cynthia for that. By the way, you’re really rocking the Cornhole Queen hat. So, I thought I’d include the link to Sam’s video in case anyone is interested in seeing where we live. Both Peter and I have “blink and you miss it” moments. I’m at the 4:19 minute mark at our spring concert last March. Your eye will be drawn to people walking into the first row on the stage but if you look at the 2nd row…there I am. Peter’s moment to shine is at the 9:13 mark. We were at the Grill for dinner with friends. You can see Kathy next to Peter, but only the top of Stephanie’s head, the back of mine and only a tiny sliver of Jim’s face. There are so many of our friends in the video. I just want to give everyone a big, virtual hug. We really love living there and are so glad we made the move. Anywho…here’s the link, so if you have a spare 12 minutes, give it a look.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZeMyvg0Or6o&t=4s

Back to our Brussels adventure. Ghent is a much bigger city than I thought, third in size after Brussels and Antwerp. Who knew?? So, while we’re only a 15-minute walk from one train station, we needed to get to the larger train station one the other side of town for our train to Brussels. Not a problem as it’s only a 10-minute ride and an easy transfer. Except the trains out of our station are old and not in the least bit handicapped friendly. There were 3 very high steps getting into the train and while I was able to give Peter a shove up the stairs to get him in, I was having trouble getting the wheelchair into the car. Luckly a guy who had just gotten off was still hanging around and help me lift it. Then when we got to the main Ghent station, there was no lift or down escalator to get off the platform. There were, however, 3 flights of steep stairs. Once again, a kind stranger helped by taking the wheelchair down while I helped Peter walk down. The good news is that the train to Brussels was on a newer platform with a lift. There were still stairs to get into the train, but they were much lower so it was a little easier to get on. Except, once on, there were 2 levels of seats, one up a flight of stairs and one down a flight of stair. So, we stayed in the vestibule for the 30-minute ride to Brussels. Peter sat on the stairs, and I stood for half the ride, then moved into the wheelchair. Again, we had help getting off the train in Brussels and found the lift to get out of the station. What a nightmare!!

Our first stop was the Grand Place, probably the most beautiful square in all of Europe. It’s dominated by the Town Hall. Construction on the square began in the 11th century and was completed in the 17th century.

There are gorgeous buildings all around the 223 by 361 ft square. Here’s a video I took.

As you may have heard me say, Peter actually pushed the wheelchair more than I pushed him because of the uneven, cobblestoned sidewalks/streets. I was able to give him a break a few times when I found flat surfaces, but they were far and few between. Gotta love these old European cities.

After walking around the square, we decided we’d had a rough morning, so we deserved a delicious Belgian waffle for a morning snack.

After our snack, we headed off to the Cathedral, where we found the City Sightseeing bus. It wasn’t a hop on/hop off, but a round-trip sightseeing bus like we used in Bordeaux. We thought this was a perfect way to get around this very large city without wearing either one of us out. We had a 40-minute wait, so I popped into the Cathedral while Peter waited on the bus.

The Cathedral of St. Michael and St. Gudula is a medieval Roman Catholic church. Construction began in the 11th century and reached its current form by the middle of the 16th century. The inside looked much like the many other churches we’ve seen, but I thought the pulpit was exquisite.

Even the back was beautiful.

We ate our sandwiches while waiting for the bus to leave. When it finally did, we enjoyed the 60-minute ride around the city.

Brussels is not only the capital of Belgium, but the capital of the European Union.

The Royal Palace isn’t open for tourists so all we got was a drive-by photo from the bus.

This is one of the largest triumphal arches in Europe. Its unique triple arch makes it the widest, but it’s 4 meters shorter than the Arc de Triomphe in Paris.

Once the tour was over, we headed back to the Grand Place as Peter had to see the famous Mannikin Pis statue. There’s really not much to see as it’s quite small, but it’s like the Tower of Pisa, you just have to see it. Then after you do, you walk away saying….okay….that’s it?

After 2 minutes here, we turned around and went back the way we came to get to the central station. When we got off the tour bus, we were only a few blocks from the station but…gotta see the little guy peeing into the fountain. But we didn’t just want to turn around, so we decided to stop for our afternoon snack of Belgian beer and frites.

There’s some debate as to who invented fries…the French or Belgians. In France, they call them French fries but in Belgium, they’re simply called frites. Whatever you call them, they were delicious.

For my foodie friends, here are a couple of pics you might enjoy.

The train ride home was a reverse of the trip to Brussels except we lucked into a car that had a few seats just inside the door. And, we had plenty of help at the main Ghent station as several people helped Peter climb down the stairs of the carriage while another helped me with the chair. We didn’t even attempt the train to get us back to our station, so we took a taxi. It was well worth the 27 euro not to have to worry about Peter climbing up/down those gigantic steps.

Based on today, I’ll be driving to Bruges tomorrow instead of taking the train. I’m not wild about that idea as I’ve driven in Bruges and finding parking is not easy. But it’s better than dealing with the safety issues getting on/off the trains. I’ll let you know how it goes.