Bruges

After our brief stop in Antwerp, Matt and Denise and I caught a train north to Bruges, which is known as one of Belgium's top tourist traps, if not its top. I'd heard mixed, and often polarized, opinions of Bruges from friends and couchsurfers. Some find it quaint, romantic, beautiful, and even magical. Others find it fake, touristy, and boring.

My opinion fell somewhere in the middle. It indeed had several beautiful churches/cathedrals, including one with a high belfry. And the architecture was nice, though nothing better than I'd seen in Leuven, Gent, or Antwerp. But it also was pretty boring, with virtually every cafe being a tourist spot rather than a local, quiet place to grab food or a drink. And the volume of tourist foot traffic really grated on my experience as a walking tourist.

A shelf of erotic chocolates in a Belgium chocolate shop. Say hi to Denise in the mirror!

The less erotic assortments of chocolates.

Matt's pot of mussels at a Flemish restaurant

Denise was a trooper, climbing herself and her bun in the oven up the stairs to the top of the belfry, where we had a panoramic view of the city.

Again, the city was fairly boring, and we didn't have too many options for activities apart from churches. There were a handful of museums, none of which seemed particularly remarkable. I encouraged Matt and Denise to go to the campiest of the options, which was the french fry museum. I thought that it might be fun, and might teach us some cool stuff about fries. 

I was wrong. Dead wrong. It ranked up there with the torture museum and the Heineken Experience I went to in Amsterdam in 2002 (and, relatedly, have not returned to since moving here). It was an utterly boring tour through rooms with placards that detailed the botanical history of the potato, the European conquest of South America and adoption of the potato, nutrition facts about the potato, etc.

The highlight of the fry museum

Out tickets also let us into the Chocolate Museum, which was equally disappointing. The highlight was the picture below:

The highlight of Bruges

Amsterdam Cats

Cafes (bars) in Amsterdam often have their own cats. Cafe Gollem, one of my favorite spots in town, apparently has (at least) two. And they're apparently quite social. The first one jumps on out table outside and stalks out plate of cheese, while the one inside calmly drinks from a goblet of water on the bar.

Antwerp

Matt and Denise and I planned a short trip to Bruges, Belgium during their week long visit to the Netherlands. The trip requires a transfer in Antwerp, so we walked around the town for a few hours before resuming the ride to Bruges.

Belgium: where mediocre pizza comes with rucola

I'd had an hour walk around Antwerp when I missed a connection between Gent and Amsterdam in November, but the only notable site I got to see is that train station, which is considered to be one of Europe's most beautiful. We did not have a time limit this time (train tickets on the intercity trains are good for an entire day, and do not have specific reserved seats), so we aimed to visit the main cathedral in town and a famous beer bar.

Antwerp Central Station

Before visiting Gent and Leuven in the past year, Belgium was not high on my list of countries to visit. I'm not sure where my subtle prejudice came from, but it was especially strong toward Antwerp, perhaps because of the city's phonetics (some combination of "ant" and "twerp"). Regardless, these prejudices were deeply misguided. Each visit to Belgian cities has revealed streets, cathedrals, and food that boggle the mind in their beauty. The historic center of Antwerp was as beautiful as Gent and Leuven, but in a slightly more imperial way.

On our way to the historic city center, we saw what we thought might be the main cathedral. Even after realizing that it wasn't the cathedral we were looking for, we stopped inside. It turned out to be Sint Jacobskerek (Saint James's Church), which is the Antwerp starting point for pilgrims traveling to the Santiago de Compostela. It felt like a bit of a beautiful cluttered mess inside, with paintings, furniture and sculptures crammed into small wings of the cathedral, and some rooms sealed off and covered with scaffolding. 

After leaving Sint Jacobskerk and following road signs to the city center, we turned around a corner and were greeted by Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekathedraal (Cathedral of our Lady),one of the largest churches I've ever seen. It has the highest church tower in Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg (404 feet), and it has 86,000 feet of floor space. Its interior was as impressive as its metrics, with a special feature of a Peter Paul Rubens exhibition.  

After leaving the cathedral, we wandered further around the historic center, had some sandwiches at a small cafe, and (disappointingly) saw that the bar we had hoped to visit was closed (though we decided to return the next day on the way back from Bruges - see the previous post). And, after a few short hours, we hopped on the train for the hour ride to Bruges. 

Architecture in the historic city center

Kulminator

Matt and Denise and I had two goals during our visit to Antwerp en route to Bruges: we wanted to see the large cathedral in the historic center of town, and we wanted to drink beer at Kulminator, a bar that is renowned for its aged beer selection. Unfortunately, Kulminator's opening time threw a wrench into our plans; it did not open until 4:00pm, and we arrived at 1:00pm. So we decided to push on through the Bruges and stop back at Kulminator when we connected in Antwerp on our way back to Amsterdam the next day.

The plan went off without a hitch. We walked quickly through the light rain on the crowded Antwerp sidewalks and arrived at the bar at about 4:15, just after an extremely loud group of Belgian hooligans, who inspired an hours worth of eye bulging and eye rolling from Denise and Matt and me, and just before a group of about a dozen older locals who were getting their afternoon strong beer fix.

A little over half of the Chimay Blue options, with alcohol content on the left,  followed by volume, year, and price.

The menu lived up to its reputation. The bottled beers were described on 20 or so pages, with each cellared year getting its own row and price. As I'd read online, the bar was owned and operated by a couple in their 60's. When the wife of the duo came to take our order, Matt and I had made little progress in going through the menu and deciding which of 400 beers we wanted to order. We asked her what she'd recommend on draft, and she told us that she currently had a trappist beer that was only being served at the Kulminator. So we went with that.

The La Trappe on tap

Denise was trying to protect against fetal brain damage, so she didn't order any beer. She did want some food, though, and Matt and I thought a snack would go well with the La Trappes. So we ordered the smallest and least expensive plate of cheese. Which also happened to be the largest plate of cheese that any of the three of us had ever seen. And maybe the most delicious.

Cheese Mountain

Something on the menu caught my eye as Matt and I were drinking our La Trappes: a row that seemed to advertise a flight of three Chimays, one each from 2012, 2002, and 1992, for 23 euro. Chimay Blue was the highest quality, fanciest beer available when I was in college (and right before the U.S. craft beer explosion), typically reserved for special occasions. I couldn't pass up drinking one that had been aged for 10 years - that had basically been bottled the same year that I'd tried the beer for the first time.

The owner opened and poured each for us, and she noted the decreasing carbonation as time passed. In contrast to her pour of the 2012, which had been slow and careful, she poured the 1992 from a few feet above the glass in an effort to whip up a little bit of head. The bottles showed their age as well, with the label on the 1992 deteriorated and covered with some kind of dusty material.

The contrast in flavors was incredible. The 2012 tasted like a typical Chimay Blue, the 2002 tasted a bit sweater, and the 1992 tasted a bit like port. Matt thought that they started tasting more like chocolate as they aged; I thought I caught some hints of sour cherries. Regardless, they were all delicious, and this ended up being a beer highlight, up there with touring the Stone Brewery (well, and Deschutes Brewery, and Rogue Brewery, and Sam Adams Brewery).

Interior of Kulminator

Amsterdam Skies

The epic heat wave that is ravaging half of the U.S. seems a world away from Amsterdam, where the temperatures have hovered between 60 and 70 degrees for the past two weeks, with an occasional surge to 75 when the clouds clear at just the right time in the afternoon. We've had a respite from the rains that put a damper on last year's summer, with many nights allowing locals to jam into terraces and patios to dine and drink beer and wine late into the night. 

It wasn't supposed to be like this, according to the weather forecasts. Serious thunderstorms were forecast for several nights this week, and they never materialized. Yesterday's forecast called for a 100% chance of rain, and although it was technically correct, the rains were limited to thirty minutes around 12:00. The storms did leave some fluffy white clouds that glowed next to the sun during the day, and shined with a bright pink between 9:00 and 10:00 at night. It's difficult to top the beauty of the skies in the Sonoran Desert - like Forest Gump said, "In the desert, when the sun comes up, I couldn't tell where heaven stopped and the earth began." But the rare Amsterdam evenings like last night have their own beauty.

A packed canal side cafe right off of the Amstel

View from the base of my apartment

Sunset behind the Intercontinental Amstel, one of the nicest hotels in Amsterdam

The Amstel, flowing into the center of Amsterdam

Rembrandtplein

FEBO, where you get your (garbage) food from the wall

Looking north from Central Station

Looking south from Central Station