Manneken-Pis

Today we spent an enjoyable half day in Brussels. I say half day, but Tommy would say whole day. You see, we spent probably 3 and a half hours in the Royal Museums of Fine Arts of Belgium. Tommy loved it. I was glad I had my ipod with me.

After I was finally able to pry Tommy away from his beloved paintings (don't worry about him, he'll see more in Amsterdam), we headed to St. Michael's Cathedral. The cathedral was build between 1200 and 1500. This church is where royal weddings and funerals take place.

Can you find Tommy?

From the cathedral we headed to the Grand Place, or main square. The Grand Place has been Brussels' market square for 1,000 years. The square is made up of the Town Hall on one side, the King's House on the other and former guild halls filling in the rest of the area. It's a beautiful square. We got a couple sandwiches and fries for lunch and sat on a curb in the square to eat.

they grey building on the left if the King's House, now home to a museum

former guild halls

Town Hall

panorama of the square

After lunch we wandered down a few blocks to find the Manneken-Pis statue.  For some reason, this tiny statue is a landmark in Brussels and there was a sizable crowd around the statue. The city commissioned the Manneken to show the freedom and happiness of living in Brussels. Visiting VIPs from other countries bring the statue an outfit, but the statue didn't have on a costume today. The statue isn't really very exciting but I did get to "accidentally" bump into some rude tourists who were not watching what they were doing.

We did some chocolate window shopping and finally settled on a shop to buy some chocolates in. We got some chocolates to take home and some chocolates to have while we're here.

Next time we write we will be writing from Trier, Germany! The train will take about 5 and a half hours, with a few train changes in between. We hope you all had a wonderful weekend!