A Weekend In Brugge

It was my third week here in Aachen and autumn was just around the corner. From my first day here, I knew I have a lot of places to visit, but there are just so many weekends that I will have here. So, I got to plan ahead of time so that none of the weekends got wasted by staying back in my apartment.

I decided it would be Bruges for this weekend.

It’s a beautiful canal city in the northwest of Belgium and I didn’t need to think twice about visiting it. All I need to know is how to get there and what to see there. Bruges was about 4.5 hours away from Aachen. It would take a 1 hour bus ride followed by 30 minutes of waiting time and a 3 hour train ride to get to Brugge. It’s not that far away, just perfect for a weekend trip.

Bruges’ main attraction is it’s historic city center where it’s the World Heritage Site of UNESCO.

The first thing I did was to hit the city center where the Grote Markt (Big Market Square) and the Dweersstraat (how to pronounce it?) is. The Dweersstraat is actually just row of restaurants right in the middle of the city center. The buildings looked a bit like those in Amsterdam; that’s because this is the Dutch speaking side of Belgium.

The second thing I knew (or actually smell) was the smell of horse’s shit. It’s almost everywhere at the Grote Markt! Then there was this very loud sound of klik-klak, klik-klak, klik-klak everywhere. Soon I and it was actually the horse carriage carrying tourists around the town’s cobbled roads.

The smell of horse’s shit didn’t really bothered me. It was such a nice sight at the Grote Markt, with the Dweersstraat at one side, the Provinciaal Hof in another, and the Belfry at another side. The Belfry the most prominent landmark in Brugge with it’s bell tower.

I was undecided whether I should climb the narrow, winding and steep 366 steps of the Belfry. The last time I climbed something similar was in Tallinn back in 2007. I think it was about 250 steps and it took like 15-20 minutes. Not only you need to climb, but negotiating the traffic in the narrow and winding stairs takes some skills!

No doubt the view will be amazing at the top of the Belfry, but at the end, I decided against it. There was a long queue outside and it was raining, so I thought I’ll do it tomorrow. I hate waiting, what more if it’s raining.

The whole day was spent either shielding myself from the rain, or walking around the old town and enjoying its canal views. I waited for the night to come to capture the beautiful reflections of the buildings over the canals. It didn’t disappoint.

The next day, it was bright and sunny throughout. The original plan was to leave Bruges for Aachen around noon so that I’ll be back by 6pm.  I couldn’t resist the clear blue skies on Sunday that I left Brugge at 5pm and arrived back in Aachen almost 10pm.

But nevertheless, it was worth the 5 hours delay. Brugge certainly look better under a clear blue sky.