Huge day sightseeing in Brussels.

6/12/12

We got up after a really good night's sleep and decided to head out for a look around Brussels. It was very cold but our bike jackets keep the cold out very well. It's so cold that I have to keep my camera inside my jacket or it freezes up and refuses to work. Suzanne wears her bike boots and tells me her feet are toasty warm. I wear my new super lightweight runners, and my feet get cold. It was then that I saw a pile of snow on a car windscreen, and I thought - snowball. Yup, Suzanne copped a big snowball right in the middle of her back. Ha!

We walked for what seemed like ages following our little tourist map and then found a nice little bar for lunch. We both had an omelette with salad and it was just so good. The food here is spot on.

The architecture here isn't as pretty as some of the other places we've been, but there is the odd stand out...

Suzanne said this is the house where the witches live.

Further down the road we found statues and a war memorial like I've never seen before.

 The top of the war memorial.

The base of the war memorial.

Then we found this...

...a giant Smurf.

We then made a quick visit to Chocopolis, a Belgian chocolate shop. "Would you like a complimentary sample sir?" I don't mind if I do. It was very yummy, but again, we can't carry much on the bike, so it was no sale.

Then it was time to visit one of Brussels most famous land marks, Manneken Pis. This is a small statue of a boy peeing in a fountain. When I say small, I mean about the size of a large cat. Yes, it's that small. When we got there he was dressed up as Santa Klaus. To say the whole thing was a bit of a let down would be an understatement.

That's it. A very small statue of a boy taking a wiz.

 There was a large crowd there taking photos.

You can read all about him here and find interesting facts like: He has over 800 outfits, and so on. http://www.brussels.be/artdet.cfm/4328

It reminded me of something out of South Park.

We made our way toward our final target, Saint Catherine's. We'd been told there was a market and ice skating there and it was worth a visit.

On the way there we walked through the central square where this giant "Christmas tree" was set up. It is lit in all different colours and changes colours in time with the music being played in the square. It was pretty good to see. Here are a couple of blurry shots of the tree...

Wow. Saint Catherine's Christmas Market was beautiful. Take a look...

 Nearly every building was decorated  with lights.

Everyone uses white lights, not colours.

 Saint Catherine's, illuminated.

A Ferris wheel at the end of a row of stalls. 

 Part of the ice skating rink.

 Part of the amazing Merry Go Round...

 ...and a little bit more.

Suzanne tucks into champagne and oysters.

We wandered around these markets and had a very enjoyable evening. It was such a beautiful place, the cold, the ice skaters, the stalls selling all sorts of goodies. We drank champagne and ate oysters, bought some incredibly good cheeses, and enjoyed a few nibbles. It was just one of those nights that clicked.

We finished off with a very nice dinner in a French Restaurant, then a taxi ride home. It was a very full day, we'd walked for who knows how far, and we were exhausted.

Next stop Belgium. Where in Belgium? We'll let you know when we get there.

5/12/12

We enjoyed a great day today.

We planned to get going early in the morning and try and make the most of any good weather that was available. That is we were hoping there might be a bit of sunshine, and a temperature above six degrees.

We had a lousy night's sleep as there were tradesman painting on our floor, and they were noisy. We both had a bit of a sleep in and ended up riding out of the car park just before lunch. To be fair, the manager at the hotel gave us a free night and half price parking, so that was good, but we were still tired and had a challenging ride in front of us.

On our way out of Amsterdam the temperature was hovering between one and two degrees. As I've said before, with all the gear on it's not too bad.

Light rain started to fall. After about half an hour on the freeway I said to Suzanne "Is this rain, or is it snow?" It looked like rain, but wasn't hitting as hard. Suzanne laughed and said it's rain. Then I looked to the grass paddocks on the side of the road and asked "OK, if it's rain how come the grass on the side of the road is white?" Yes, we were riding while it was snowing. I can tick that one off the bucket list.

We rode in the snow for about forty five minutes. I must admit I did laugh to myself quite a bit while we were doing this. Visibility was a bit of a problem, and I was getting a build up of ice on the bike screen. 

The temperature stayed on one degree for some time (I don't know if the thermometer goes any lower on the bike) and the BM instruments flashed up a little snow flake on the dash to remind me to be on the look out for black ice.

Our target was to get to Brussels, but an hour on the bike in these conditions is about as much as I can take. I'm fine except my thumbs get frozen, and my toes aren't far behind. I'm going to make some dodgy hand guard extensions for the bike, and try wearing four pair of socks. The heated grips are on the maximum setting, but I can't actually feel any warmth coming from them. I hate to think what my hands would be like if I didn't have them. 

Sorry, no photos of the above. As much as I wanted a photo, I wanted to find somewhere warm more.

We made a short detour into Antwerp and found a nice little Italian restaurant. When I pulled up outside and Suzanne was getting off the bike, she got her foot caught on the seat of the bike and fell flat on her bum on the road. Luckily with all her padded riding gear on, Suzanne didn't feel a thing. I'm sure it looked funny from inside the restaurant. What Suzanne thought was funny was that I tried to help her up while holding up the bike. She could see it going all wrong and both of us lying on the road trapped under the bike.

There was a staff of six in the restaurant and one of them owned a bike. When he asked where we were from, and we told him Australia, he turned to his mates and said something which got the usual "Wow" sort of reactions, and one guy made swimming actions with his arms. We were looked after extremely well, and defrosted quickly. The coffee was especially good.

Yes, I had to go out and feel the snow.

I couldn't help myself.

After our warm up break it was back on the bike, still riding in the snow, for a quick fifty kilometre ride into Brussels. We want to go to Luxembourg, but staying there is very expensive, so we'll make it a day trip. As we have a habit of doing, we rode into Brussels in peak hour, in the dark, in the rain, and the cold. We've got to get better at this.

Brussels peak hour.

The first hotel we checked was full, but they pointed us in the direction of the Reyers Hotel, which was just across the intersection. Suzanne went to reception while I sat on the bike outside. There's no point in us both taking our gear off if we have to move on. Our intercom works well and I can hear her when she talks to people  in the hotel. Score - we have a room for tonight, and it's really cheap, only seventy Euros. Oh oh, that is cheap. The Ibis down the road was 164 Euro. Hmmm?

I walked in and met Bruno at reception. Bruno is what you would call a character. He has a long white beard and hair, and dark eyebrows that flick up on the ends. His sense of humour is as dry as. When I asked if I could leave my bike outside the front door he said "Of course. But if it was my bike I'd put it downstairs in the basement garage where it will be safe."  We asked what time breakfast was available and Bruno replied "When ever you feel like it. Just try to be down before four o'clock. Before twelve would be good also."

So we were in our cheap hotel. We went up in the tiny lift and exited into a hallway with grotty carpet, complete with stains, and some sections missing. We both said, OK, it's just one night. We were very pleasantly surprised when we walked into our room. It was spotless, and very nice. Happy happy!

Time for food. We were told about a restaurant on the corner about fifty metres from the hotel. When we got there were found the menus were bilingual. They were in French and Flemish. Fantastic! Now both my French and Flemish are a bit rusty so I had to enlist the waiter's help. Luckily he spoke English. Once again we experienced the Aussie phenomenon. Our waiter was very polite and did nothing wrong at all, but when he found out we were Australians, he was our best mate. Nothing was too much trouble.

Dinner was great and I discovered Duvel beer. It was only after I'd had what was probably too many, I found out it's 8.5%. It was nice though. I was then introduced to Dr Suzanne. We spent hours psychoanalysing why I stress out so much when I pack the bike. It was very interesting and I learnt a lot. Now I just need to work out how to fix it.  I guess I'm a work in progress...

Dr Suzanne's notes.

We had been watching it snow from inside the restaurant but now it was time to go. We wandered outside and of course we had to write in the snow on the cars...

We miss you Paige.

It was a great day. Tomorrow is tourist time in Brussels.  We'll have a look around and might head off to Luxembourg in the afternoon. We'll see how we go.

We're in Amsterdam for another day.

4/12/12

We had a bit of a sleep in in the morning and it was extremely cold, so we chickened out and decided to stay another day. There are certainly worse places to be stuck than in Amsterdam.

We went for a stroll into town to find a cafe for breakfast / lunch and came across a nice little place that came complete with a cat.

He was a VERY playful cat and I went home with a few good claw injuries on my fingers to prove it. 

He had a great right swipe. 

Come on. Play with me.

He was a lot of fun, and loved playing with drinking straws. After lunch we were leaving and the owner said to us "We are open from eight to five, and the cat will be downstairs just after eight." I think she realised I liked playing with the cat.

After that we walked across town to Anne Frank's house. It was a very sombre experience walking through this museum. We are talking about a thirteen year old girl's life and her suffering at the hands of the Germans during the second world war until she finally died just before the liberation.

I cannot fathom how this sort of thing was allowed to happen, and it's recent history. The problem is that we are still doing the same thing in some parts of the world. The human race has a lot to answer for and a lot of growing up to do. I hope our children do a better job than we, or our parents, have done.

After the Anne Frank visit we had a very quiet dinner and caught a taxi back to the hotel. It really was a very moving experience.

It's finally snowing.

3/12/12

We woke up this morning to snow. Wow. For a little West Australian like me, seeing this white fluffy stuff falling out of the sky in a whole new experience. I've only seen it snow when I've been skiing at Mount Buller in Victoria, but never in a cityscape. It was really cool. I really wanted to go for a ride while it was snowing.

My bike sitting out in the cold,

and feeling very lonely.

Yup, that's really snow falling.

We decided it was probably a good idea to stay in Amsterdam another day and maybe head off the next day when it wasn't snowing. We just had a quiet day hanging around the hotel and resting.

My Heineken Experience, then the red light district.

2/12/12

We made a late start this morning and walked into town to get some lunch. On the way we saw this:

You want it, these guys will have it.

This is Concerto, the coolest record shop (do they still call them that?) I've ever been in. It is actually five shops side by side and sells vinyl, CDs, DVDs, T Shirts, and all things musical. Each shop is a different genre. One is current stuff, one is classical, another is old rock and roll and blues. I think I could live in there. The last one houses a cafe with some huge photographs of recording artists performing, hanging on the walls. It has just the best atmosphere.

Amsterdam is not a bad little spot.

A few blocks up we found a little cafe and we had lunch. My burger was perfect, and very filling. Two things have become obvious in the short time we've been here. Firstly, the food is exceptional. Every meal we've had has been really tasty, and made fresh on the premises. Secondly, the staff here are all happy in their jobs. They are friendly, efficient, and are happy to have a laugh when the opportunity arises.    

Back on the street I noticed this building:

There was a crooked man,

who lived in a crooked house...

This building really is crooked, it's not a fault of the camera lens. Once I noticed this, I saw quite a few more buildings that were like this. They sort of lean on each other. Then I noticed that some lean out toward the road as well.

Around the corner we found this:

Rembrandt Square.

The square is named after the famous painter Rembrandt van Rijn. The figures in front of his statue are characters from one of Rembrandt's most famous paintings, The Night Watch. OK, art history lesson over.

We found the ticket office for the Hop On - Hop Off bus tours and bought tickets for the bus as well as for The Heineken Experience. Now Heineken is my favourite beer and it was born here, so a visit to the Heineken Experience was a must. It's sort of an interactive museum. A little bit of history, a lesson in how beer is made, a tasting, a lesson in how to drink beer (yes, I learnt something), some modern history, some beer, and of course a shop.

 Tasting Wort, the first stage of beer.

It wasn't bad.

The real thing.

Half full, or half empty? 

 My lesson in how to drink beer.

At this point I had my beer, and another that the guy gave me, then Suzanne's. They were only little ones though. We continued the walk through tour and arrived at a audio visual presentation, where you are the beer. You stand in a small room on a  platform that moves, and you are taken through the process of making beer, from the beers point of view. Along the way you are shaken, sprayed with water, and heated up with strong heaters. It was a bit of fun.

Then it was a further wander to end up at the Heineken bar, where we got our drinks.

Two beers are included in the price of your tour. As Suzanne doesn't drink beer, I had access to four beers. When I walked up to the bar and got my first beer, the guy asked if I wanted another beer and put it on the bar in front of me. He said he had already poured it, and if I didn't take it he would tip it down the sink. Well, you can't waste good beer can you?

That was me. Two beers and I'd had enough. Oh no! It's OK, we've arranged to go back the next day to "collect" the remaining three. So all is well.

Merry Christmas from Heineken.

Of course there was a shop on the way out. It was pretty big and had nearly everything you could want in the way of souvenirs. I could have shopped up large, but I can't carry anything on the bike.

Really good tour and worth the time if you're in Amsterdam. It costs fifteen Euro and includes a couple of beers (at least), the sampling, a ferry ride through the canals, and a souvenir bottle opener.

The thing that stuck in my mind was that Heineken is so hugely successful world wide and they only make one product. Heineken Beer. No other products, no variations, nothing but one type of beer. Interesting. 

OK, back on the walking path again we saw this:

A wooden pushbike! 

Can you imagine this in Australia?

Meals on wheels for termites.

Street art, Amsterdam style.

 The canals by night...

 ...pretty eh?

Christmas decorations I think.

We found a really nice Argentinean restaurant and had some delicious tapas then made our way to the infamous red light district. 

How much does the land settle here?

We found a bar and sat down for a few drinks. I found it a little bemusing, looking across a canal with beautiful white swans, at girls on the other side pedalling their wares in their windows.

The purity of these white swans 

was in contrast to the rest of the surroundings.

And that ended what was a full day. We were tired and it was getting unbearably cold, so we grabbed a taxi back to our nice, warm hotel. 

We're in Amsterdam.

1/12/12

The ferry PA system woke us at 6.30 am, far too early. Our plan was to get up, have a leisurely breakfast, and be one of the first off the ship. We went back to sleep and woke up at 7.30 when the first call went out for passengers to disembark. Just after eight we walked onto an empty car deck, pointed the bike at Holland, and rode down the ramp into a lovely four degrees and rain. It's funny really, we didn't see much rain in England at all, but as soon as we lob in Holland it rained on us.

I rode to the immigration checkpoint. The guy in the little booth looked at us, twice, and for a long time each time. Then he said "Why are you here?" To which I replied "We're on holidays". He thought for a moment, checked the other stamps in our passports, and asked "It's summer in Australia now isn't it?" Suzanne said "Yes. We're crazy aren't we?" He smiled and said "Yes". We got our stamps and were on our way to Amsterdam.

As much as we liked the UK, it was good to feel the wheels rolling on the wrong side of the road in Europe again. Something different is something good. 

Amsterdam is quite a pretty city. There are lots of old style buildings and the architecture is easy on the eye. The canals add a touch of interest as well. I had no idea there were so many canals. We rode around looking for somewhere to have breakfast and finally found a place that looked good. I dropped Suzanne off and went to ride around the block and park the bike. Suzanne said she wanted her passport in case I didn't come back. (Insert sarcastic tone here). As if I'd do that. So off I rode. A couple of left turns and I'd be back where I started, park the bike at the end of the street, and walk to the restaurant. 

Hmm, no left turn. OK, I'll go down another block. Five minutes later, not one left turn, I had no idea where I was, and I'd crossed a couple of canals as well. Oh oh! I really did think I might have seen the last of Suzanne but I'm sure she would be happy in Holland. Then I saw a building that we rode past on the way into town. I backtracked and found Suzanne standing on a street corner (Working already?) looking a bit worried. The restaurant we stopped at hadn't opened yet. Ten minutes later we found one that had just opened the doors. I don't have any idea what the parking laws are here, but we parked on the footpath and went inside the nice warm restaurant for breakfast. They had the best coffee I'd tasted in ages.

Then it was off to find the Ibis Styles Hotel. These places are great. They're cheap, but present very well, and include free breakfast and wifi. OK, they don't offer the facilities of a five star hotel, but we're only sleeping there and spend the rest of the time exploring. They're perfect and about the same price as a backpacker's.

The Amsterdam itinerary so far consists of a visit to the Heineken (My favourite beer) Experience, the Ice Bar, the Cat Museum (Yes, that's right), some other museums, and of course, a tour of the red light district.

We left the hotel to go to the ice bar and made it about twenty yards before we stopped. There was a restaurant on the corner that looked OK and we were hungry, so we went inside. We had one of the best dinners ever. The fish with risotto was deluxe (and I don't like risotto normally). I'm not a desert person either, but our main was so good I decided to give desert a try. I had figs in orange syrup with ice cream and chocolate drops. It was brilliant.

We had a chat to the owner, who was a really nice guy, and when he found out we were Australian he told us about his other restaurant which serves lobster dishes, and invited us to visit. I like my food, so I think it's a date.

We wandered off toward the Ice Bar. It was now that I realised my super light running shoes offered no warmth at all, and that the rest of the world is not like Perth (It's only taken six months!) and you can't go out at night wearing only a thin shirt. I was bloody cold.

Anyway, we made it to the Ice Bar.

A photo of a dodgy tourist photo taken inside the Ice Bar.

OK, lets be honest. The Ice Bar is nothing more than a tourist trap. Imagine a couple of refrigerated shipping containers, running at ten degrees below zero, turned into a bar, complete with Perspex replicas of ice sculptures. They charge you to go in and give you a two "free" drinks, show you a 3D movie, and kick you out after forty five minutes in glasses made of ice. I'm not complaining, I had four vodkas because Suzanne didn't like any of the drinks on offer. Do the sums. About thirty people, at fifteen Euro, ten times a day, plus drinks. Not a bad little business eh? The highlight was the girl running the show, Anita, was from Melbourne. Bloody Aussies are everywhere!

With Anita's directions we decided it was time to visit the "Red Light District". We walked off in the right direction but were distracted by another bar, and after a drink, decided it was time to call it a night (Suzanne can't keep up) and grabbed a cab back to the hotel.

Hopefully tomorrow's weather will be a little more kind to us. 

We're packed and on the road.

30/11/12

Well, after a struggle our gear was squeezed onto the bike. Do you know we have over a kilogram of cables and chargers with us. Then there are the computer, camera, spare batteries, and so on. It all adds up very quickly to be far too much weight, so we culled as much as we could. Let's hope we haven't left anything behind we need.

We wobbled off down the road. It's been a while since I've ridden the bike fully loaded. I'd forgotten just how heavy it was. We got away about two pm which was a much later start than I would have liked, but as we weren't sailing until about eleven pm, and the departure point was only two hours away, I wasn't too worried.

We swung by Brian and Julie's in Essex to say goodbye and to pick up my first UK fine. I was captured on camera riding down a road in London that I wasn't allowed too. I can remember riding through an area thinking "I don't think I should be in here" but it was London, peak hour, dark, raining, on a Friday night, and I was following the sat nav's instructions. I'm going to write them a letter begging forgiveness for my lawlessness and I'm hoping that being an Aussie, they'll let me off. After all, we saved the poms bacon more than once in two world wars. Didn't we? Unfortunately Brian and Julie weren't home. It was a shame because it's always nice to see them. They are just nice people.

Next stop was a camping store where we picked up another Pacsafe, then we had everything we need security wise. Did I mention that the temperature was around three or four degrees and it was very cold riding. We bought some extra thermal socks and put them on in the shop. 

So here's a run down of me getting dressed to ride today. Jocks, thermal socks, another pair of thermal socks, triple layer riding pants, boots, T shirt, thermal shirt, jumper, triple layer riding jacket, buff, balaclava, helmet, thermal gloves, and, finally, motorcycle gloves...and I was still cold. 

As we got close to Harwich the temperature hovered around two degrees, then dropped to one and a half, then one. Yes, cold. With six miles to go the BM trip computer told me I had forty five miles left in the tank...as we shuddered to a stop with no petrol. Not again. Luckily I had our camp stove fuel bottle full of fuel and that one litre got us to Harwich. 

We made it with plenty of time to spare and decided to have a feed at the hotel near the port. I have lamented a few times recently that you don't see T Bone Steaks on the menu much any more. So when there was T Bone on the menu the decision was easy. I had the biggest T Bone I've seen in years.

We rode up the ferry ramp (as the first vehicle again) at around nine pm. After the bike was secured we found our cabin, dumped our gear, got changed, and found a bar to sit and have a drink. Half an hour later we were tucked up in our bunks and ready for a good sleep. The cabin was quite small, but very well appointed and very comfortable and I got the top bunk. Yay!

Good bye UK, it was fun. Tomorrow morning we'll wake up in Holland and trundle up to Amsterdam. I might even buy a pair of clogs.