Got another late start, haha ha, but managed to finish packing and take our last tube ride to St. Pancras station. Just walked right up to the Eurostar counter, asked for ticket to Brussels and boom, we go check in and wait to board... easy-peasy.
Here's the girls on the escalator going to the train platform. Another beautiful train station.
And rolling through the French countryside over 100mph.
And we made it. Brussels Midi station. _Now_ it feels like we are in Europe. The language barrier really drives the point home. But, we were able to buy tram tickets from the automated machines sans a chip and pin card and get to the right tram. No wrong stops and we make it to check in for our apartment. A short walk after getting the key was easy and we get settled in. The apartment is _really_ nice and the location is primo.
So we quickly start our own search for the best french fries. What? french fries are a Belgian invention and they have the best (french (actually frenched) refers to the culinary practice of cutting into strips, not the country). Fried potatoes, add duck fat... pure genius. The above batch was for our walk to our destination batch.
Second batch at Fritland... _really_ good. It's also nice they have 8-10 different sauces too. The 'pita', oil and garlic, was a crowd favorite.
Bring on the waffles. There's two main types, Brussels and Liege. Brussels is very light and flaky with no sugar. The Liege is thick and chewy with pearl sugar that caramelizes in the iron. The Brussels is what people in the US would recognize as a 'Belgian waffle' and the Liege is the most popular in Belgium... and I know why. Just amazing. Of course layering with high quality Belgian chocolate does nothing to hurt.
The girls were tired so Cindy and I snuck out by ourselves.
Here's Cindy at Manneken Pis just down from our apartment. Believe it or not, it was crowded just to get a picture of it. We thought it was pretty funny.
We went to Moeder Lambic, a famous bar, and had drinks. The Saison was good, but the trippel, Bons Voeux, was excellent.
OK, one last chocolate and waffle... who wins? We both do!
Since it was so close, we walked to the Grand Place before heading back to the apartment. Now some rest... see what happens tomorrow.
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