Jeff came to visit and we had a wonderful time! He managed to peg 4 countries and 7 cities in just 10 days! After arriving, I met him at the airport and we were off on our way to Belgium! After a very fun train ride (people were staring at us because we were laughing so loud...we were laughing so hard because a man on the train had the biggest cell phone we have EVER seen!), we arrived in Brussels! We had both forgotten that Belgium is outrageously famous for their waffles, and were conveniently reminded as we walked through the train station. We just had to get on! So we got the most gooey, warm, not all the way done waffle coated in Nutella...yum!! After asking the girl working at the waffle stand for directions (Jeff's French was quite helpful here), we made our way to the hotel. We checked into our hotel which was conveniently located close to the train station and in the heart of Brussels.
We headed out to wander around Brussels and while many people had warned Jeff that there was little to do in this city, there were TONS of people out shopping, chocolate galore, music on every corner...it was quite charming! We wandered around and into some chocolate shops and found our way to some dinner. We were intent upon getting mussels in Brussels because they are quite famous for their mussels (not just their waffles!) The mussels were delicious and came with another Belgian specialty...French Fries! Which were actually invented in Belgium not France. We explored Brussels for a few hours more, Jeff was quite intent on finding the gay district which is advertised by a large mural of two guys walking down the street together. Well this "district" was only about a block long with not much happening at the time but we did manage to snag a few pics of Jeff with the mural before heading back to bed in preparation for our bike tour the next day!
The next morning we head out for our bike tour. It was just Jeffrey and I and one other girl on the tour with a guide, who we do not remember the name of, we have been referring to him as Fritz though, so we will go with that for the purposes of the storytelling. First of all, it was fun just to be on a bike through the city, though not so fun when we were biking through highly pedestrian areas! Fritz had a very awkward way of stopping us and asking us if we had questions. And then quizzing us throughout which made us all feel bad that we knew little to nothing about Belgium before the bike tour. It was like being on Family Feud...he says to us "Why is Belgium famous?" and we blurted out all the stereotypical answers : "Fries! Mussels! Beer! Waffles! Chocolate! Lace! The peeing boy statue! Cartoons!" Anywho, the bike tour was really fun except for when Fritz was being offensive or quizzing us...and we ate the "best french fries" in the world from some stand. But since we had eaten fries the night before, we were a bit fried out. We ate them none the less and they were quite delicious, but I still think McD's on a good day has them beat ;)
So after seeing the sights of Brussels via bike we decided to hop a train to Brugge, which is considered the "Venice of the North". Many people had told us how beautiful it is and only an hour or so away from Brussels. After a torrential downpour during the train ride, we emerge from the station in Brugge to stumble upon a beautiful double rainbow in the sky! Then we are off on our way to see the town before nightfall. Brugge was like a very cold version of Venice. The canals were very pretty and the town was lit up for Christmas. Most of the shops were still open even though it was Sunday (everything is closed in Germany on Sundays...) and we checked out stores with mainly the same things that the stores in Brussels had: chocolate, lace, and other souvenirs. We ate at a pretty fancy restaurant on one of the canals. We both ate some sort of boar stew...it looked like poop but tasted okay, but was nothing compared to the amazing dessert platter that followed it containing the most delicious chocolate mousse in the world...
We also tried some interesting beers in Belgium. Jeff had a cherry beer which was absolutely phenomenal. The peach beer was also quite good. I, however, decided to try the blueberry beer...this was absolutely revolting! After dinner and the beers, we headed back to the train station to go back to Brussels for the night. I left in the morning to come back to Darmstadt for class and Jeffrey went to Amsterdam for the day and night.
On Tuesday, Jeff came back to Darmstadt and we spent the afternoon at the Christmas market before he crashed hardcore from all the traveling. We awoke on Wednesday and he conned me into skipping my class and going to Heidelberg with him. So off to Heidelberg we went! We walked through the Old Town and the Christmas market, and spent way too much money buying cookies, but they were the most delicious little star shaped cookies ever! We continued up to the castle, and we got the audio guide this time (I had been to Heidelberg before but I did not do the audio so everything was new for me). The weather was uncharacteristically sunny and nice for our castle tour and we had a great time. The audio guide was complete with historical facts and accompanying sound effects which were quite amusing.
We hopped a cab back to the train station because we had a train to catch to the airport and were running a bit late. The cab got us there on time and we were off to the airport with Diet sodas and sandwiches in hand. Jeff loves hardboiled eggs and was pleased to see how much they are utilized in Germany. We decided the egg is way underutilized in America. The Germans put hardboiled eggs on most of their deli sandwiches which is yummy! So we arrive at Frankfurt airport quite early and without any problems...this is rare for being with Jeff I think ;) and we're off to Madrid!
***There are many more pictures, just ask me when I get back if you want to see more of Jeff's funny Heidelberg faces ;)
Hi Meghan! I've decided you are definitely having way too much fun and it's time to come home!! ;) I can't wait to see all of your pictures and hear all of your stories. Be safe...17 more days!!!
ReplyDelete