Pacific Hotel Blankenberge

... city. Awesome architecture and canals winding around the city, as I took tons of pictures as always and just enjoyed the city.

Apparently Brugges had a movie made recently with it as a location; I'll have to check it out sometime. The main "art" piece I saw was a Madonna with Child from -the- Michaelangelo from Italy. It was quit nice, as were the countless other paintings and sculptures I saw in that ...

Today was a many miles day - around 500 in fact, or about 800km! We all met up in a carpark on the outskirts of Macon, then travelled in convoy north. As we were travelling such a long way today, we all decided to use the motorways, as despite being toll roads and meaning we'd see a bit less scenery, it was well worth it as we'd get to stop for longer on the way and get there earlier. The tolls were quite expensive compared to what I'm used to (it cost us about 21 Euros/NZ$42 for the ...

... went to as well (hey, it was raining the whole time). This was considerably better than the fry museum (although not as funny) and we got a demonstration on how they make the famous Belgian Prailines.
Other than that, our 3 days in Brugge were filled with more choclate, beer, and fries (and one waffle) and admiring what the cute little town has to offer. Now we're off to Amsterdam... wish us luck!

... went for a wander around the Beguinage and the little streets of the city before stopping for lunch in a restaurant on the main square, which was really nice and served local traditional food which was really great.

We wanted to go up the clock-tower but the queue was far too long and we decided that we could go back another day during the week when there weren't so many tourists!

The Christmas market had just started in Bruges so we spent quite a while wandering ...

... the streets towards the windmills. They have a gorgeous walkway and park all along the river with 2 huge windmills. They don’t seem functional but they are surrounded by white fences that have been twisted, the same way lace is, to create a fabulous design. Brugge is known for their lace and this seemed like a nice reminder. We enjoyed the scenery a little bit before making our way back to the campsite.

Next stop Brussels!

... for the day.Ghent is a nice place with an amazing central area full of churches and imposing buildings.Unfortunately the entire area was under construction so it didn't have the same effect.
Brussels was larger than the other cities, and we picked up a similar local map to visit thehidden gems on offer.
(Whitney)
Bruges is a really lovely city, enclosed by a river that runs around and through it which results in ...

... for beer and the corresponding glasses...because every beer in Belgium has a specific glass that you are supposed to drink it from. We spent as much time as we could in Bruges before we had to head back to Brussels to catch our plane and we still needed more time in Brussels to meet up with a friend from Clemson. I was sad to leave Bruges. It was definitely an amazing place to visit.

... did this in place of Taco Tuesday to mix it up a little. In two weeks, for Alli's birthday, which is also on Tuesday, she and Kelly are hosting a White Trash party in their room. Can't wait! We drank classy drinks, like wine, before heading to the Herzberg for some dancing. It was an all around good night, just not sure it is going to have a good effect on my 6 hours of class tomorrow. Oh well!

... drinking the water, and it wasn't uncommon for people to be drinking 6L of beer a day!!  They say that is why they were happier back then! We got to go onto the roof of the building and it made for good views over the roof tops of brugge, we also got a free beer and this was very nice, Brugge Zot it was called worth a try if you ever see it.  We wandered back to the hostel for tea and headed out later o to see the town at night.  We had to wait ...

... my way back to England. I'm for sure going back to Lancaster, but who knows if I'll find a job there or how the visa thing will work out. I'm really really hoping it does. If that doesn't work out though, I might go back to work in the youth hostel I stayed at in Amsterdam. I really like the ministry they have there and I made friends with a lot of the staff. They said they'd love to have me. Either ...