Thursday, October 31, 2013

Bruges: Part III

With just 2 hours left, we took a canal boat ride.  The ride took only 30 minutes, but we ended up waiting for 45 minutes to get on the boat.  Here are some pictures I took - not great ones, but they give a flavor of the town from the canals.


 This is just a gratuitous Belgian Ent, captured on film from the water.
 This illustrates the difficulty of picture-taking on the boat trip.


 This was in an area of town where the Tanners worked. I wonder if the Dyers were nearby. Both smelly occupations.

I just love these old houses with the basements with docking facilities.

 I think the tour guide said this unusual house with the wooden facing was used in the movie, In Bruges.

So that was the tour.  Quick, but interesting and I learned something by listening to both the English and the French dialog.  The word 'Burgher', as in the wealthy ruling class of a medieval city is translated in French as 'Bourgeois'. Which might be the most interesting (to me) thing I learned today. 

After the tour, we needed to make our way back to the bus, so we meandered a bit, and bought Belgian Waffles for a snack.  Mine was Caramel, the COG asked for 'Slagroom' not knowing what it was. Isn't he brave. It was whipped cream, so he was rewarded for his courage. 



They were very sweet and not a life-changing experience. I'm sure there are better ones somewhere.

Then, back to the bus; back through the Chunnel; back home by 10:30 or 11:00.  The COG now feels satisfied that he can check Bruges off his lifetime list. I haven't told him I'd like to go back and spend a couple of days in a room overlooking a canal and visit every church and museum in the town.  


2 comments:

Kate said...

I hope that canal ride was worth your while. That took over an hour of your precious time! Beautiful old buildings, in any case. I wonder if these are still privately owned, and if there is public subsidy for maintaining them?

The Bride said...

Yes, the canal ride was worth it - just to see Bruges a bit from the water. Many of the buildings are private homes. Others are holiday lets.