AND. WE. DID.
It was cold and rainy when we landed. It was another shaking landing almost crashing the entire plan and causing a cabin full of heart attacks (probably an intern flying that thing). Ryanair, Im just not convinced this airline is even legal! In Belgium, they speak French or Dutch. Since we know NEITHER, the five of us were utterly lost for at least an hour. We took a few trams and got near our hostel, but we still weren't really sure where it was. It also seemed that no one knew where the hostel was either. This was an uncomforting fact..
On the tram, a girl overheard us speaking English and we found out she was lost looking for the same hostel!! Kelsey is just a wee little thing traveling around Europe for 40 days, celebrating her graduation! She's also a knuck-el-head (Canadian folk)! It was cool to meet someone so brave, traveling alone, just living it up!
Brussels and the five of us only had 24 hours together, so we wanted to make the best of it! After finally finding our hostel, we all changed and warmed up a bit then headed out to the Grand Place. The great thing about only having a day in Brussels is that EVERYTHING is doable within 24 hours. All its landmarks are within a few miles.
This architecture blew me away. The rain really sucked, but it was still GORGEOUS!
Grand Place
It was extremely rainy, cold and windy!
Gothic architecture
I did some research before our trip, and many of the blogs mentioned this 'Delirium' bar! Its all about its Belgium beers, but we later found out it was also all about its creepy, old men..
All of our fancy beers!
On our way to the bar, we stopped by a hole-in-the-wall waffle shop. Here I found the most amazing thing in the world. Its called Spekulus and EVERYONE should try it!! Its also called 'cookie butter' back in the states. To me it tasted like warm, gooey teddy grams made into a spread that is almost like Nutella. I swear my life by it, it will change your whole outlook on Nutella though!!!!
I have reoccurring dreams about this Spekulus...it's the most wonderful invention.
Maeve (behind me) is such a dork....
Since it was raining and Brussels is really just known for its architecture, we decided to start our beer drinking early, having seen all we could in Grand Place without getting drenched. After our first few beers, we started to notice this clearly older fellow with a permanent smile. For the rest of the night, this Finnish man (with the creepy smile) would NOT leave us alone and DEFINITELY didn't understand what personal space even is.
As our night kept getting more rambunctious, the Finnish man made friends with another man of his age. They formed a team. Luckily, I was on the farthest end of the table from these men and was never touched. My poor friend Abby though, she took the brunt for all of us!
This is the Grandpa from the movie UP
As an eye witness myself, she was NOT coming on to him!!!
As you can see here, Abby (the blonde) is trying to move away from the man. Molly (the phantom arm) is LITERALLY trying to create the barrier between the innocent girl and the MEGA creeper!!
Why is he creeping in on their selfie?!
All of the sudden, a man that looks like the grandpa from the movie UP, bought us a round of Absinth (not the good stuff, I think its finally illegal in most bars). We obliged because what kind of Americans would we be to deny free alcohol?
I found some Welsh rugby guys and we all had a great time talking about the game. It actually makes me feel at home when I meet a rugby fan/player. For the most part, they all were ridiculously nice and even shouted "USA USA USA USA USA" for us.....then "County Roads, Take Me Home" and "Born in the USA".
This night went on and on...
These are the rugby guys!! They were a bunch of fun!
We decided 11:30pm was plenty late (having started at 4:30 in the same bar) and we taxied home.
Brussels was more than I could have ever imagined. Phew..
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