The summer of 2024 was time to travel to the country famous for chocolates, beer, castles, waffles and diamonds. I have travelled to Netherlands and France a few times but had misses out on a beautiful country in-between these 2 countries. The country has great location and is well connected. Our son Kartik , who is working in the USA also found it convenient to join us there . I am glad we decided to spend 6 days here as this much time was needed to explore Brussels and neighbouring cities. It turned out to be a good family holiday and it was more fun as my cousins were also there.

Brussels Centre is the most vibrant and historic part of the city. Just reach Grand Place and you will find all the action around that. Then there are some good places just 10 minutes drive away like Ixelles and Saint Gilles. Our decision to stay at ‘Hilton Garden inn hotel’ at Saint Gilles was based on 2 factors :

1) It had a family apartment within the hotel which had 2 bedrooms and a living room. I have started loving the concept of well located apartment as it gives you a feeling of space rather than just a room. Our grown up children were travelling with us so it worked out very well.

2) The good hotels in city centre were exorbitantly expensive so even after spending money on cabs it was well worth staying here. If 4 people travel in a cab then it works out cheaper than public transport. Uber was very convenient.

The City Centre – Grand Place – Grote Market area

This is the heart of Brussels and it is here much of our time while in Brussels was spent. For a tourist this would be the first place to visit. It has everything – the historical buildings, shopping area, best beer pubs, great restaurants, the waffle shops, the tempting chocolate shops and the most loved symbol of Belgium- The Manneken Pis.

The Grand Place Grote Market is a touristy place and Brussels’ main square. The City Hall is the most impressive building in the square and it is a sight to behold inside and out. The Gothic architecture of its exterior will capture your attention on each and every tiny detail. The ensemble of buildings around the square makes it one of the most photographed square in the world and is always full of people. Here you feel that you have come to a totally different era of the past. Then you walk around and soon you will see several beautiful and tempting chocolate & souvenir shops. The variety in chocolate shops was mind boggling. A little further there will be restaurants, bars and shopping centre with all top brands. If you want some glamour and upmarket feel – just walk to ‘Galeries Royales Dt Hubert’ which is a gorgeous glass roofed arcade and some nice shops and restaurants. Twice we ended up eating at the ‘Brussels Grill’ restaurant opposite Galeries Royales as it had some nice barbeque food. As this is a touristy area you will find a lot of restaurants with indoor and outdoor seating which is very common in Europe. The largest queues were in front of the famous takeaway which just sold ‘fries.’

The languages spoken in Belgium are Flemish and French. French food is quite common here. We did go to a very upmarket French restaurant on the last evening which was at the edge of a forest. There is some problem in several restaurants as the menus were not in English. We used google translator and often some waiter would help us out.

The Manneken Pis

I had asked others from our group to follow me to this statue. They expected something grand. Manneken Pis turned out to be a small bronze statue that measures just 50 cm and represents a small naked boy urinating into a fountain’s basin. Pissing ! It was the smallness of the statue that surprised everyone. It was really tiny. Through the years there have been several legends associated with this statue. He is known to possess around 1000 costumes and some costumes have been given by the various presidents of the countries that have visited Brussels. The 3rd image above is the same statue as the first image but on a different day in a different attire. In the Museum made for him ( Musée de la Ville), housed in La Maison du Roi, visitors can discover all the little hero’s wardrobe including regional dresses, a bullfighter or Elvis costume. While each of us were surprised by the importance of this little fellow- there were the famous waffles to be had nearby and also a very unique beer bar called the Poechenellekelder.

It was unique due to its interiors and decoration. Some have described it as quirky décor. But the beer list was impressive and they served in matching glasses.

Beer – The soul of Belgium

You can enjoy more than 2,000 beers from around the world. Delirium Café holds the Guinness World Records for the number of beers available for tasting : 2,004 record obtained in 2004. You can choose from the Trappists, famous Belgian Abbey, strong brown beers, fruits or lighter from Belgium and the world. And for lovers of different tastes, they had unusual beers like chocolate, banana, with walnut Coco, spices, hot pepper, gingerbread and also had gluten free beers. They don’t encourage free tasting so I tried a paid sampler set and decided on something which tasted similar to our Lager. It was an entire lane owned by Delirium with several pubs and restaurants. Each outlet seemed to specialise in something different.

We went to many pubs during our stay and tried many different kind of beer including Guinness at an Irish pub. On a nice sunny afternoon all the pubs would have seating outside and you could see thousands of people having different kinds of beer on one street. I wonder if there is anyone who doesn’t love beer in this country. It became evident that they love beer when I saw people having beer early in the morning when we came out for breakfast near our hotel. Strangely beer was easier to find than breakfast at 9 AM.

There are a lot of things to do in Brussels but that you can discover yourself. People love going to Atomium and several museums. Don’t forget to visit the hero Tintin’s museum near the Grote market. We all had devoured all his comics when we were in school and it was wonderful seeing him and Captain Haddock along with all the support cast come alive in the museum. They had several souvenir’s as well.

A visit to Brugge & Ghent

Now this city of Brugge is such a lovely city. A train takes you there from Brussels and reaches in an hour, and you can walk to the city centre either through quaint cobbled lanes or a slightly longer route along the canal. We walked through these lanes which had boutique shops and sweet little houses. As you approach the main square there is a lane with proper shops and also a famous church known as Basilica of holy blood. We spent some time in the this impressive church and then visited a few shops. Soon we had reached a very pretty and bustling square surrounded by monumental landmark buildings. The Burg square was full of people and activity. It was a carnival atmosphere as the sun was out and tourists were plenty. We walked behind the square and discovered many shops and restaurants before finding a restaurant next to the canal. It was so relaxing to watch the boats navigate the canal while we had beer on this brilliant day. We then moved to another restaurant near Burg square which served great mussels. A trip to Belgium can’t be complete without their 4 specialities : Beer, Waffles, Mussels and Frites (fries!).

Brugge is not very far from North Sea which we navigated a few days later on a cruise and I believe a lot of people come here from cruise ships as well. Halfway between Brussels and Brugge is another nice historical city of Ghent. As our train ticket was for full day we stopped in Ghent and took a tram to city centre. As it happens – these small towns start shutting down at 5 PM so we couldn’t spend too much time there. In any case everyone appeared tired. Ghent actually deserves a proper visit but do it before you make a trip to a much more famous Brugge.

The Indian Embassy and the Ambassador

It so happened that my classmate Saurabh from school is Ambassador of India to Belgium. I called him up and he immediately invited me for a chat over a cup of coffee at the Indian Embassy. The Indian Embassy was very pretty with a historical building and lush green lawns. I was told that the embassy had more land but as the embassy didn’t require so much – it was given to the city of Brussels so it could be used more usefully for the citizens. That was a great gesture. Saurabh was full of praise for the country and it’s people. It is something that I totally agreed with !