Impressions of Belgium

It's flat and it's wet.

There's a lot of farmland, dotted with small towns with their austere churches.

There's a lot of history here from the past hundred years. Lots of Great War cemeteries and battlefields.

I found a gunner pilbox in the middle of a town.

Everywhere we went, people asked us about the upcoming US election. The opinion all over Europe is very pro-Obama. One guy commented, "Everyone I meet from the states is voting for Obama. So who would vote for the other guy?". We could only conclude that the Other Guy's supporters just don't get out much.

We spent a night in Watou, where St. Berndardus is brewed. The brewery has a really cozy B&B attached to it if you don't mind the smell of malty hops invading your sleep.

Those tall post is where the hops are grown- they are all over this area and they call this the Hop Capital of Belgium. They had just had their hop-harvest, so the hop fields were a little bare.

Watou is right on the border of France, and the Mont du Cats is close by on a hillside, where the monks make cheese and beer. We took the pilgrimage up the hillside in pouring rain, giving the monastery a rather mysterious air to it.

Watou also had a fantastic little town square filled with good places to eat.

We had the best dinner of our trip at 't Hommelhof.

It was a fantastic find- they are making fresh, locally derived food in inventive ways, but not too fussy. I love places like this.

More of Bruges

Brugge at night...

It's very quiet at night. The streets are more or less deserted, and it doesn't really seem like too many people actually live in the city center. It didn't feel unsafe at all- the worst we saw the whole trip was dog poo on the sidewalk, and other than that it was a squeaky clean place.

Amusingly, at 4am I got woken up by a loud, drunk American who was outside my window asking the world where is hotel was. It's easy to get lost in Brugges. If you like beer, it's also really easy to get drunk.

Bruges was important port city for ages. Here, there was a huge cloth and textiles industry. They still make really gorgeous lace and needlework in the traditional way.

Some of the interiors were incredible. While the churches aren't as flashy and huge as those in France, they made up for it in the detail and liberal application of color.

There was also fantastic food to be had. Aside from wonderful mussels and perfectly cooked frites, they had some very good restaurants to choose from. Lots of very fresh seafood and french-inspired cooking.

Brouwerij

In the spirt of the place, despite my palatial resistance, I did end up seeing, touring, tasting at a few of the classic breweries in Belgium.

Most of them have a history going back hundreds of years. Monks seem to be the #1 instigators as far as the brew industry is concerned. Based on marketing, all of Belgium was populated with jolly drunk monks at one point. Or so I am led to believe.

Inevitably, the back of the rental car became stacked with cases of suds. It sounded like Marly's ghost was accompanying us for the ride. Except instead of chains, Marly was on a bender and clinking bottles instead.

Apparently, getting a few cases of this Westlederen stuff is a really big deal for beer geeks. Getting any at all involves having your license plate taken down and a monk limiting the amount of cases you can haul away, and you can only get this particular beer at the monastery. People line up for hours to take some away.