Roadtrip Belgium Bruges Brussels -

Roadtrip Belgium Brussels

This week saw us catch up with friends, explore Belgium and cross the border into Holland.

It is always nice to see friends and family in different parts of the world. Those who are travelling fulltime know that it is sometimes hard to know where and when you will be in a particular place. When people go to the effort of fitting in with those tentative dates it is truly appreciated and special.

Not to mention when Miss B gets the opportunity to learn some more French. Catching up with a friend who she has seen in two other countries already = special memories we hold dear.

I am trying to reduce the length of the youtube video weekly wrap, but am cutting so much out already – I promise I will try harder!!

June 12

Walking around Bruge was delightful! The architecture was so beautiful, we walked for hours. Brett having visited before was a great tour guide for Miss B and I. Beautiful buildings, quiet streets all cobblestone and unique. In parts it felt like we were alone in the city!

Belgium is well known for their tapestry and lace and there is a fair bit of both in the centre of town.

We saw a wonderful sculpture of a whale.

5 tons of plastic waste pulled out of the Pacific Ocean, turned into a 4 story tall whale for the 2018 Bruges Triennial.

This was fabulous to show Miss B after all our environmental studies and discussions on plastic in our oceans we have covered this year while worldschooling.

June 13

Again, arriving in Gent, we opted to walk into town and spend time just walking the streets (in a nice way!) The amazing architecture carried on here and the views along the River Leie were beautiful.

Castle of Counts and the fish markets, lanterns (lamposts) on the Sint-Veerleplein are connected to the maternity wards of hospitals in Gent, glowing slowly everytime there is a new birth.

It is a reflection on the history of both the Castle of the Counts and of the Sint-Veerlepein as a place for executions.

A place of death now a place of birth!

When travelling through Europe you have to remind yourself to not become complacent of the beauty and history you are witnessing on a daily or hourly basis.

It is extraordinary and we appreciate so much being able to show our daughter its beauty and discuss the history in our own time.

June 14

We made our way towards Brussels and found a wild camping spot with benefits. De Gavers is a lovely area with multiple walking/jogging/running tracks.

Along the track there are a variety of exercise equipment and activities to use. We love the opportunity to do a bit of training for our upcoming treks, not to mention great physical education for Miss B!

We all tried every activity and had a blast, think Miss B was a little surprised how her old fart parents did! LOL.

The wild camp was right beside it so we re-did it the following day too. Really lovely area and lots of people enjoying the track, pond and walking tracks.

June 15 – 16

We arrived in Brussells to visit our friends.

It is so lovely to meet up with friends you have met on previous travels. Lots of laughs, talking, catching up on the last 12 months!

Going out for dinner (rare for us while roadtripping) was a special treat, let alone for a beautiful french dinnner – soooooo yum!

We had so much fun and got a personal tour of Brussels city, Miss B happy to have a friend to explore with.

Brussels is everything you imagine it will be, beautiful architecture, cobblestone streets and lots of history.

Such a lovely day, visiting the Manneken Pis, the famous statue of the little boy, you guessed it, pissing.

Jeanneke Pis is a modern fountain and statue in Brussels, which was intended to form a counterpoint to the city’s Manneken Pis, south of the Grand Place.

It was commissioned by Denis-Adrien Debouvrie in 1985 and erected in 1987. The fountain was built in honor of loyalty. (??)

Belgium is famous for its beer. We believe in good research and
therefore we tried as many different types of beer as possible while in Belgium, in the name so research of course.

There is lots of footage in our weekly wrap on youtube.

June 17

Caught up on some work, made some changes to the blog and got totally carried away and did not hit the road until much later than expected.

Always sad to leave friends, especially when you have had so much fun but we will undoubtedly see them again somewhere round the world soon.

We had a late arrival into Limburg at a wild camp, making our way ever closer to Holland.

June 18

Arrived in Holland, going straight to Maastricht buying tickets to visit the underground tunnels. There is a lot of footage in our weekly wrap, it was fantastic and we highly recommend it to anyone visiting Maastricht.

There was 22,0000 tunnels only 2000 remain. It was so interesting and cold down there! It stays at between 10-11 degrees all year round.

An interesting fact there are bats that hibernate there in winter, and they all go to the exact same place in the caves (no matter how deep) when they come back. They know exactly when the weather turns, even though they are in a consistant 10-11 degrees. Got to love nature!!

Miss B got to carve some of her own Marlstone which was 70 million years old and contains fossils. This piece pictured had octopus tentacles and a shell!

Our guide was really great and informative. For those of you interested in more info I have included an North Caves Info Sheet English – a great resource (we wish we had of known about it beforehand).

Leaving Maastricht we stayed in Vianen, Utrecht. Had a lovely walk around town, so peaceful you wonder if anyone is there at all!

Watch our weekly wrap with more photos, footage and details of what we got up to here

What did we take

If you are interested in what we took, electronics, kitchen and all things we needed for the duration of our roadtrip click here. (we are slowly adding each week as we have data/time)

Having done a three and half month roadtrip last year in South Europe we were pretty confident in what we would need’this time. Also, what worked and what we would not bother taking again.

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