Brugge Lucy and Dom enjoyed their first visit to Brugge a few weeks ago so much that they decided to go back again and invited us to join them. So off we set on our fourth visit to Brugge this year.
Dukes' Palace As usual, we got the Eurotunnel to Calais, then drove to Brugge. Getting to the hotel proved to be somewhat harder than anticipated thanks to a closed road a couple of hundred meters from the hotel that took almost half-an-hour to navigate around!
BMW Lucy’s BMW outside the Dukes Palace.
Zwarte Huis Having checked in to our comfortable room, we headed out to look for a beer and some dinner.After a couple of very nice beers and some nibbles in ‘t Brugs Beertje, we moved across the road to de Hobbit, where we had some more very nice beers and some rather challenging ribs (I reckon I burned more calories getting the meat from the bones than I got from eating the meat I’d liberated).To finish off the evening we relocated to the excellent Zwarte Huis, which you can see in this photo.
Chimay Unfortunately, we had not allowed for the combination of the strength of the beers and how late the bar stayed open, so we got back to the hotel in a fairly poor state just before 2am :o(
Hotel View Saturday - The previous evening’s exploits significantly contributed to the fact that it was almost lunchtime on Saturday before we managed to drag ourselves out of bed for our first look at the view from our hotel room. It was quite a nice view too.
Dukes' Palace Garden The hotel has a lovely garden considering that it’s right in the middle of town. I thought I was maybe hallucinating the huge pink poodle, so it was a relief to see it show up in the photo.
Dukes' Palace Garden The garden from the other end of the terrace.
Judith's Window A stained glass window in the hotel with Judith’s initials.
Dukes' Palace Staircase The main staircase in the hotel.
Halve Maan Brewery Given that it was already lunchtime, we headed straight to the Halve Maan Brewery for some of their magnificent beef stew. The first beer of the day was a bit tough going.
Bottling Machine There was an old bottling machine on display in the bar/restaurant.
Snuffel Bar We spent the afternoon walking about and bar hopping before ending up in Snuffel, where this photo of Judith and Lucy was taken.
R&B Just up the road from the Snuffel Bar is R&B, which, as its name suggests, is a ribs and beer restaurant. We tried to come here when we were in Brugge a few weeks ago, but it was rammed. So this time we took the precaution of making a reservation. Just as well too because within fifteen minutes of them opening at 6pm, they were full and turning people without reservations away.
R&B Lucy and Judith perusing the menu. But there was only one thing to order in Ribs & Beer - all-you-can-eat ribs and beer. Okay, that’s two things.The ribs were magnificent. If there are better ribs anywhere, which I doubt, I would very much like to know where they are.
't Zand After dinner we went for a walk to ‘t Zand, where I took this photo of the statue/fountain before we headed back to the hotel for some much needed sleep.
Halve Maan Sunday - Having checked out of the hotel fairly late, we thought we’d be as well to pop back into the Halve Maan brewery for a bit more beef stew before we headed back to Calais.
Beach Having had a quick tour around the beer shops, we retrieved the car and headed for Calais. As we had a bit of spare time and it was a lovely day, we decided to drive down the coast road. This is a photo of the dunes and the beach (not that you can see much of the beach as the tide is in) somewhere to the west of De Haan.Another lovely weekend in Brugge. And we’re already scheduled to be back in Belgium in a few weeks time. Excellent.