Brussels, Belgium

Soon we headed back to the car on the metro, and left Paris behind. We had an amazing time, but it was time to go to our next country. We left in a bit of a rush, as we had 500km of road to cover before we reached Amsterdam. Perhaps we were in a bit too much of a rush. Artur was tired, and let Loren drive for a bit. The highways were easy to drive and the cars were all going pretty fast. We passed a toll booth, and a a policeman was standing on the other side. He waved us over to the side and asked to see licence, registration etc. He said Loren had been driving at 147km/h, and the speed limit was 130km/h. Loren had to get out and go into the office which was set up near the toll booths. He fined her 50 Euros and sent her on her way. He asked lots of times if she could speak french, and was trying to catch her out on it. Artur said it was better not to speak French, and to play dumb, so she did. We were actually pretty lucky for that to be the only fine we got on the whole road trip. We had covered more than 7000km of road, speeding most of the time, so we were lucky. It's also probably why Loren wasn't too scared speeding, because most tollways are not patrolled, and they pretty much leave you to drive as you like. This time was just unlucky. Soon we were back on the road again, with Artur at the wheel. We stopped about halfway through the journey at Brussels, Belgium. Loren had always wanted to go to Belgium, so wee decided to stop there for lunch. We had trouble finding a parking place, but luckily we found one right in front of a handmade Belgian chocolate shop!
Brussels was absolutely filled with little handmade chocolate shops. We went inside and had a look at the one near our car. The smell was amazing, and there were so many to choose from. We could have spent all our money in there, it looked so good. We bought some chocolate truffles to try, and some chocolates for Artur's parents.
Next we walked to the Central Square. It was really beautiful, wih enormous buildings on all sides. There was a Palace, and the gothic Hotel de Ville. This building was the only building not to be bombarded by the French in 1695. This is quite funny and ironic actually, because the Hotel was the target of the bombardments! We had been driving for a while, and both needed to use the bathroom, but we couldn't find one for the life of us. Apparently public toilets haven't made it to Belgium. We tried to use one at a restaurant, but they snobbily told us that it was for patrons only. We decided to give our patronage to another restaurant because of their rudeness. We chose the restaurant next door, and sat in the outdoor seating area on the square. They didn't have much in our price range other than a hot chocolate, so we both had one of those. It seemed an appropriate choice in Belgium. They hot chocolates were lovely, and they came with a wrapped homemade chocolate on the side. We had a great time admiring the square, and wishing we had longer to explore this place. On the way back to the car, we saw many other little stores selling traditional Belgian products. There were lots of places selling Belgian lace, and handmade crafts. The other thing that caught our interest was the smell of the Belgian waffles on sale. We had already had chocolate, and a bag of chocolate truffles stashed in our bag, but the Belgian waffles were just too tempting. We bought one to share, and it was absolutely delicious! We didn't regret buying for one minute, in fact Artur wanted to buy another one! It was a great little stop in Brussels, and we certainly made the most of its famous chocolate. As we drove out of town, we saw lots of other amazing old buildings and squares. We even saw the famous EU headquarters. Brussels was even better than we had hoped for, and we'd love to come back one day.

To see the photos from the post in slideshow mode, click on on the link below:
Brussels pictures