On Friday morning we left Konstanz and headed to Lausanne, Switzerland. We met Michelle’s friend Jamie at the train station and after depositing our luggage at his flat, he took us out for a few hours to tour the city. And what a city it is! Lausanne is literally hills. Everywhere. And steep hills at that. Not for the faint of heart, and especially not for the faint of legs! It is an incredibly beautiful city – pictures are on their way! Lake Lausanne is bordered by mountains. The view from the train is absolutely breathtaking – words cannot possibly describe how incredible it was to see the lake surrounded by hills and little houses all over the hills. The sun was shining for our arrival in Lausanne which made it even more incredible.
After a (free!! Thanks to Jamie :)) evening in Lausanne, we packed up and headed off to the train station to spend alllll day Saturday making our way up to Belgium. For those of you who have access to (or are interested in looking up) a map, our route was as follows. Hop on the train in Lausanne and head to Basel. There we switched trains and prepared for the LONG haul – 7 hours – which took us through France (Salsburg) and into Luxembourg. From Luxembourg we headed over to Brussels, where we caught another train to Brugge. If you ever have the opportunity, GO TO BRUGGE! It was my second time there (I went when I was in Europe in high school) and it was worth every minute of the 10 hours we spent on the train to get to it.
Brugge is an incredibly beautiful, old, quaint little city. It is surrounded – and built on – water and is very well known for its lace. It has many gorgeous churches – all Roman Catholic – and we were lucky enough to be there on Sunday to enjoy the church bells ringing. I will be posting videos so check back for the link!
We took a boat tour around the canals of the city (very funny guide :)) and then found a little market square where some artisans were displaying (and of course selling) their handmade crafts. I bought a glass necklace which can be seen in a couple of today’s pictures
After enjoying most of the day in Brugge, we hopped back on a train and headed off to Brussels. It was my second time in Brussels as well, and it is quite an amazing place. After chilling out in our hostel room for a while, we headed out in search of “frites” (Brussels is famous for its frites – aka fries) and were fortunate enough to find ourselves a ‘guide’ of sorts :). Jerome (said in a French accent) led us to “La Grande Place” – the famous Brussels square – where we enjoyed the breathtaking architecture and explored the many streets and shops that the area has to offer. It was a fantastic evening :).
That brings us back to today. This morning we got up early and headed to the train station to lock up our bags and wander around a different part of Brussels. Our first destination was a flea market which runs every day from 4am to 2pm. It was quite the sight! Little mats everywhere with merchants displaying their various items. You could find just about anything there if you looked hard enough! After wandering around and taking a few pictures, we continued on down the street. Our next stop was in a little shop that sold various jewelry and other little things. I bought a glass ring, which I LOVE!
Now we are ‘digesting’ after a really nice (and not tooooo expensive) dinner at a Greek restaurant just down the street from our hostel. We are staying in a double room so we have the whole room to ourselves, which is great. Of course it’s a mess :P with our stuff strewn about, but it sure is nice to not be sharing a room with any random people – though we met a really nice girl from Texas in our room last night!
I think we may head across the street to a pub for a drink later on tonight. OH, one huge difference we have observed between Switzerland and Belgium vs France is that in Switzerland and Belguim, EVERYONE smokes EVERYWHERE. It’s such a relief to be able to walk into a restaurant, café, bar, etc and not immediately start choking (no offense to you smokers – my point is simply that I am obviously not a smoker and prefer to stay that way). Vive la france! Hahahah.
Thanks for reading, and especially thanks for your emails! I’m going to start the replies now. Hope all is well (fantastic, really) with everyone at home in Canada.
Lots of love!
Xoxo
Candz
