Why are you here?

Editor's note: Bolded text has been added when text is also a link. I've discovered the theme being used does for this blog does not make the text that is hyperlinked the traditional blue color. Let us know in the comments if this is redundant and that it was already clear in the past what text were also hyperlinks. 


I've lost track of how many times we've been asked that question. It's always asked in a nice, but slightly incredulous way, after somebody asks us where we are from. It seems like the response is always, "Washington state? OH, Seattle!" Then they wonder how we ended up here.

Today we took the train to Antwerp.

We woke up late because we were somehow able to sleep through two alarms. It's ok we probably only missed one sight that might have been fun to go to, but I'll survive. I say "I'll survive" because of the two of us for whom our missing this particular event, it is Tommy who would be saddened the most at not seeing "Rome, Mecca, and Jerusalem in Antwerp." This wasn't a planned excursion though. We stumbled upon where it was being held about an hour before it was to close. Anyway, our plans in Ghent were to see it's cathedral, Our Lady's Cathedral, and the "Rockoxhuis" named for Nicholas Rockox, once mayor of Antwerp and contemporary of Pieter Paul Rubens.

Antwerp's train station is much more aesthetically pleasing and impressive than Ghent's.

Ghent's has more of an industrial feel rather than a Neo-Classical one.

Upon exiting the train station you're met with a road of sorts with shops and bike parking flanking each side. They have bikes you can rent like in London but there's no clear way of locking the bikes anywhere while you use it over the course of a day so we opted to hoof it to the historic end of town. That (and she might hit me for this) and Libby hates bikes. :-) The shops shift from those of the culinary sort to clothing. The first clothing store you see is a Georgio Armani shop just behind a statue of David Teniers. Don't ask me who that is. I haven't heard of him. He is flanked by stunning Neo-Classical buildings which are occupied by clothing stores.

Oh, and full disclosure, I might be wrong about the Neo-Classical thing. It's just a guess from what little I remember about certain characteristics of certain artistic eras.

Despite not caring much about the shops around me it was really enjoyable to walk along a pedestrian zone with wonderfully ornate buildings around. Car-free zones really do put one at easy when it comes to walking around. That was one of the things Libby and I were disappointed with in Bruges. We both knew it was a bad idea but it was really hard to not compare Bruges to Bath. Bath's historic center was car free and Bruges' was not and is really hurt our experience there. We kept having to worry about cars zipping by at slightly too-close-for-comfort speeds, and it made the whole place more chaotic and less quaint.

Along the way we stumbled across what turned out to be a Biketrials World Cup. Here's a video of one of the world's best Biketrial competitors. Check out the pictures from the particular competition though as Libby and I think what they had to do there was more impressive than what is in that video. The first bit of the competition seemed to be aimed at younger people. Kids around 12-16 maybe. Then when we got to the main square we came across the adults and what they were having to deal with. It was night and day. They could get themselves seriously hurt in this competition. At the end of the day we saw a couple that seemed to be medics take away a thankfully empty stetcher with a head and neck stabilizer pre-built in.

The main competition area was set up in the market square, so we couldn't get any sweeping views of the square. We were slightly disappointed, but the competition was fun to watch.

City Hall

 After around 20 minutes we found ourselves at the cathedral. Our Lady Cathedral is the largest cathedral in the low countries (The Netherlands and Belgium). The taller north tower is 405 feet tall and the south tower is 213 feet. It stretches 387 feet and is 173 feet at its widest point. This church is 'uge. Sorry, sometimes the word huge needs some Donald Trump pizzaz.  Libby was very excited to discover the only restriction on photography was regarding the use of flashes and tripods. I was excited because a lot of works from the art museum have been transferred here because the museum is closed for renovations. Some works from Pieter Paul Rubens, like The Elevation of the Cross and The Descent from the Cross are currently on display. They had a fun little audio guide that told you about each piece in the cathedral with a running theme. Voice actors played characters who represented specific guilds tell you about the piece which added a bit of in situ to it. Each piece was commissioned by, or partially commissioned by a particular guild.

After we left the cathedral we got a bite to eat. Libby had a ham and cheese baguette, and I had an open faced ham and cheese sandwich with two fried eggs on top. They were both delicious.

Once re-energized we hiked over to the Rockoxhuis. This wasn't exactly the experience Libby had imagined. Libby's interpretation of what Rick Steves' said in his book about it had her imagining a contemporary building with furniture and artwork that would have been contemporary to Rockox's life. Instead it was a contemporary building chockfull of artwork. Good for Tommy, boring for Libby. This place had installed a motion sensor approximately 60cm from the wall that would give off a very loud beep sound when the plane was broken. Most of the time there were very few people in the rooms, but a few "tours" of older people came in a couple times, at which point many many loud annoying beeps were had. It amazed me how often it happened. It's like they didn't understand why it was happening. I felt really bad for the room sitters. I was able to talk to one after a group left and I asked him if what we heard was an inordinate amount of beeps. He told me it wasn't and that he dreams about them.

After I dragged the shuffling-one through a few rooms, we left for dinner. We have been struggling with dinner here. Most of the time the menus are in Dutch and only Dutch which makes figuring out what our options are difficult. The option of musssels is omnipresent here. Mussels are to Belgians what Fish and Chips are to the English. There's also often some Italian option.

We've also had mixed results in the treatment we've had--probably due to the language thing. As an example, our experiences at lunch and dinner were night and day. At lunch once it was clear we didn't speak Dutch the young man who served us got us an English menu (not needed really) and was super friendly and helpful. When I stumbled through my beer order he said he knew what I meant and said the name I was struggling with. I parroted it to the best of my ability and he said that was good.

At dinner however I got the feeling we were not wanted. When I asked fro the check the waiter kept saying "prego" (it was an Italian restaurant). Finally we figured out the check was on the table already under a little clamp thing. He left with it and a few minutes later came back. I then tried to pay for the meal but was instructed to take my card inside to pay. I did so and seemed to be very much in the way of everything. People were trying to sit at the tables behind me, people were taking food out side which had me spinning around trying to not bump into people.  I couldn't understand why they would want me to be more in the way than I was just to pay. Later Libby thought they might not have wanted me to be out of eyesight of the card since it didn't have a chip in it as a security procedure. That's just an example of some disparate dining experiences we've had.

We're going to Brussels tomorrow!