Belgium! Ghent

On our last full day in Belgium, we got a bit of a slow start! We had been planning to go to Antwerp, but we ended up changing plans at the last minute and headed to the city of Ghent. Erin, Jerome, and Gus ended up staying in Brussels for the day to accommodate Gus's napping needs and to get a little rest. JJ and Duane tagged along with the Hennekes fam for the day. 

We left from Brussels Central again, on the same train line that had taken us to Bruges the day before. It was only about half as far as Bruges, and takes you into a train station that is a little over a mile from the city center. We opted to walk rather than take the tram, so it took us about 25-30 minutes to reach the center square. We walked through a long shopping area, which was busy in the morning but MUCH busier when we were walking back to the station later. It was challenging to negotiate the crowds with Charlotte's stroller -- we joked that it would be helpful to have a "cowcatcher" on the front to clear a path :) 

When we got to the main square, we grabbed a quick lunch at a grab-and-go type place called Exki. It was tasty and we sat outside at tables to enjoy. From there, we walked along the riverfront toward the city's castle, called Gravensteen. It was built in 1180 but renovated in the 19th century. We left the stroller and carried Charlotte up and down the steep and winding staircases. She was fairly well behaved for the most part, but unhappy when she couldn't get down to run in certain areas (along the castle's walls with steep drop-offs, for example). So much of parenting at this age is preventing her from certain death or severe injury. Exhausting at times!

After touring the castle, we walked back along the river to choose a boat tour company. The first one we tried had a bit of a wait, so we left and found another one without a wait. We hopped on and enjoyed a 40+ minute tour of Ghent by water, which was enjoyable. I continued to be impressed with the multilingual tour captains who gave their information in Flemish, French, and English. 

Along the main canal of Ghent

St Nicholas' Church

Typical medieval type architecture of Ghent

Gravensteen

Views from the top of Gravensteen

Chasing Charlotte around the top of the castle

JJ helping Charlotte climb the steps

Our last stop in Ghent was at the St Bavo Cathedral, one of several huge churches very close to the main square in town. We entered the church and were immediately surrounded by sound, as there was a free orchestra concert that had just started! It gave me goosebumps. We enjoyed the music as we paid to visit Van Eyck's Ghent Altarpiece. For the admission price, we got to listen to a little audio tour through an individual wand about the various aspects of the altarpiece. Charlotte was fairly good, but started to get a little antsy so I took her back out to the main cathedral to listen to the music. She wasn't a fan of that either, so we headed back outside and met up with JJ & Duane who had stopped to get some ice cream at a street cart. Paul joined us a few minutes later, and we headed back to the train station. Charlotte blessedly fell asleep in the stroller as we were walking, and slept until we were almost all the way back in Brussels. The train was crowded, so we ended up standing in the vestibule of the train. My feet were fairly tingling with fatigue by the time we got back to the apartment in Brussels!

After taking a brief break at the apartment, we headed out for dinner with our whole group. We tried to find a restaurant that Erin & Jerome had seen earlier in the day, but failed, so ended up eating outside at a Thai restaurant. It was delicious and much more spicy/flavorful than most British food. We stopped by a chocolatier on the way back to purchase some last chocolate deliciousness before we left the next morning.

Our trip back home was fairly uneventful; we felt very lucky to have avoided the strikes in Calais, France that have periodically shut down the Chunnel. We were a little delayed coming back, and Charlotte was generally crabby due to lack of napping for several days. We were back home by around 1 pm. It was a fun trip, and a good first taste of visiting mainland Europe with Charlotte. Looking forward to more!