Brussels long weekend

Last weekend we had Monday off, as it was German Reunification Day . So Cara and I took off to Brussels to visit my friends Annie and Erin from Queen's. We had a blast. It was so nice to get away for the weekend and to explore a new city. The weather also was amazing. It was sunny all weekend and highs of about 28 degrees! It was like being on summer holiday again :) I took a gazillion photos, so it's taken me a while to go through them all and pick some to share. Here is a few to give you an idea of what we got up to on the weekend.

Saturday:
We got in Friday night and headed straight back to Erin's house. Saturday we were up early and ready to explore. Of course we started off the weekend with a trip to see the Grand Place and Manneken Pis. We wandered around some of the tourist areas around the Grand Place, and went into pretty much every chocolate store we saw! Cara and I had our first taste of Belgian Waffles. Yum yum yum!!! We found a great hole in the wall place that sold nutella waffles for 1,75 €.

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After some more wanderings around we met up with Annie for lunch. We headed a bit away from the tourist area to the Bourse (stock exchange) and an Irish pub for lunch. 

You can tell how sunny it was outside! After we headed north west of the city to Mini Europe. This is a model Europe, with models from each European Union country. All but one of the models has been built to 1/25 scale (Vesuvius was too big so they made it to a smaller scale) and there are something like 300 models in the park. It was a great trip through Europe in under 3 hours. I took so many pictures, and have so many new places I want to go. It was nice to see some familiar buildings, like the Eiffel Tower, but also many that I had not heard of. I should mention that is was a great afternoon, except for trying to get into the park. We bought our tickets and then there was a line up afterwards. They had some stupid huge mascot that everyone was having their picture taken with. When we got to the front we asked one of the people if we could not have our picture taken and they said yes, but then the mascot and camera person attacked us as we walked past! Ok, not attacked, but they definitely were grabbing us, saying it was their job and they had to take our picture. Finally we got the message across that we meant no when we said it. I'm glad we did because at the end of the park they had all of the pictures printed out and made into key chains, just in case you wanted to buy them. Way to try and guilt you into giving them more money!

Where we were!!

A view of one part of the park. If I had turned around you would have been able to see the Eiffel Tower and Big Ben

Dutch mills! This is for you Papa :)

British parliament and Big Ben

Bath Royal Crescent. I was there a couple years ago! 

Arc de Triomphe - can you see Annie and Erin? (And me and Cara?)

Porto, Portugal!! I will be spending a weekend here in the middle of November :)

Another place I will hopefully be visiting. I am hoping to go at Christmas with Christie

Some of the models had parts that moved. The mills could be turned by a wheel, there were boats that went around in circles, etc. For the Berlin Wall behind the Brandenburg Gates, the yellow bulldozer on the right knocked a section down. 

Somewhere I would love to visit. This is the Porta Nigra in Trier (to the west of Frankfurt). It was built by the Romans in about 180 CE. It was then turned into a church in the 11th century. 

After all that trekking around in the sun we headed back for a bit of a rest and some dinner. Later in the evening we had some drinks with Erin's housemates before heading into the city for Nuit Blanche. Nuit Blanche happens in many cities across the world, and is basically an all night arts festival. (see wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuit_Blanche). 

Belgian beer and wine and applewine from Frankfurt

All of us minus one housemate (taking the photo)

We enjoyed wandering around the centre of the city looking at the various art installations and exhibits going on. Some were inside some outside. There were lots of people out. This was definitely true when we went to take the night bus back to Erin's. It was so crowded that we barely made it on, and I spent most of the trip squished against the door. It was a nice tour of the city though as we wound around back south east of the centre where Erin lives. 

These sculptures of people were made of wax, and then being melted by a current going through the wires

Grand Place lit up at night

Sunday:

After a bit of a later start on Sunday we again headed towards the centre of Brussels. Erin took us to the arches in the Parc du Cinquantenaire. Here we got to watch the people running in the Brussels Marathon and Half Marathon. We even saw one of the teachers from Erin's school. 

As it was so beautiful out we walked along the avenue running from the arches straight into the city centre. We were following the runners, so cheered them on along the way. We walked past the royal palace on our way to Erin's favourite place. 

Right by the Notre Dame du Sablon church there is a little park with a fountain. You can sit almost completely surrounded by the garden. All you can see is a little bit of the wonderful architecture of the church and royal palace. A perfect place to sit and relax. 

Next we headed back to the Grand Place again to meet up with Annie. This time we found a small cafe for lunch and then explored more of the city (and chocolate stores!). 

One of the many murals on the side of a building from the comic Tin Tin

Guides! (of some sort). We saw multiple groups over the weekend, and I had to take a photo of this group singing. As they sung they marched around and from a group into a circle

Galerie St. Hubert. Shops and cafes on the main level and apartments above

Little Italy - there were a bunch of these cute streets. I love the different buildings beside each other and the narrow, pedestrian only streets that are half covered with restaurant tables

We had a quiet evening as Erin and Annie had to go back to school on Monday. Cara and I took a walk around Erin's neighbourhood. 

Monday:

Cara and I took ourselves off the the Basilica du Sacre Coeur. A large church, one of the largest in the world (top 10 I think). We walked up the 240 stairs to the view point at 52.8 m. It was a bit disappointing because when we got there we couldn't even see the city that well because of the sun and smog. The church and area were modeled after Paris. The basilica was originally going to look much more like the Sacre Coeur in Paris and it sits at the intersection of roads similar to the Arc de Triomphe. 

Next we walked along one of the boulevards because taking the metro south of the Grand Place to meet Marie-O for lunch. She was a Belgian exchange student that my aunt arranged to have stay with my family for a short while, 5 years ago. She now lives in Brussels and thanks to facebook we arranged to meet for lunch. It was great to catch up with her and hear what she is now up to. We met in the Saint Gilles area in front of the church of Saint Gilles. 

We then walked back to the Grand Place. We had to end our weekend with a view of the Manneken Pis dressed up:

and of course another waffle! We sat in the Grand Place, watched tourists and ate nutella waffles. We had such a great time in Brussels. I can't wait now for Annie and Erin (and maybe some housemates!) to visit us in Frankfurt :)