BRUGES
The richest city of the Middle Ages
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Bruges, the capital of West Flanders, as well as the richest city of the Middle Ages, was revealed to us thanks to the lifefak: from 19:00 Friday to Sunday inclusive, the cost of travel on trains in Belgium is halved. Having learned this news, we decided to escape for a day from charming Brussels and take a walk in Bruges.
The Belgian railways did not please us with pedantry. Our train was simply canceled (this is not the first time we have this, we already got into a similar story with the Italian train when we went to Varenna ). An additional difficulty was that the next train changed its arrival platform several times, and the platforms of the Brussels station are located underground, where long narrow ladders lead, along which you must first run up to the station, then find a descent to the desired platform and run down. In the end, the train came to the same platform where we were waiting for our canceled 🤣🤣🤣
Sitting near the window, we enjoyed looking at the Belgian landscapes and 35-40 minutes later drove into the city of Ghent, which we really liked from the train window, and if we had an extra day, we would gladly go there too. But that day we were heading to Bruges, and a little over an hour to go from Brussels.
The next photo shows a piece of Ghent in the window of our train.
On the platform, we take a photo for memory under the name of the city and go out to the station square of the city of Bruges. A huge part of it is occupied by an artificial skating rink, where Christmas performances are periodically held.
The first impression of Bruges is a huge crowd that flows like a river from the station to the city center, this stream of people picks you up and carries you, with breaks at the red light of the traffic light.
The central square of the city, following the example of many cities in the world, is called the market square. In Bruges, it is very beautiful, thanks to the exquisite architecture of the surrounding buildings. The central palace in the square is the court of the province of West Flanders, which is made in the style of the Gothic Renaissance.
But on the day of our arrival, the main entrance to the courthouse was not used for the good of Themis, but to satisfy those in need to try Beaujolais Nouveau . For eight euros, men in medieval robes offered to go inside, look at the exhibits of ancient crafts and drink a glass of wine. We took advantage of the invitation, dropped in, but refused to buy a glass of wine for that kind of money.
Then we made a circular panorama of the square so that the readers could see this place in more detail. The photo below is clickable.
The Belfort Bell Tower is visible in the sun. She is one of the main characters in the movie "In Bruges" . Characters often find themselves near her, and there is also a plot denouement of the picture.
Still from the film "In Bruges"
After examining the market square, we went to "wander" around the various streets of the town.
Some sources claim that Bruges today is the city that has preserved the largest number of old medieval buildings in Europe. Whether this is true or not, we cannot say, but taking a picture near a 16th century house is not at all difficult here.
Let's talk about prices. The prices for food in cafes and restaurants where we went - seemed to us very high. A dish for 30-40 euros for wealthy European pensioners who came to Bruges is not surprising. And ordinary tourists from Ukraine had to walk the streets decently in search of relatively inexpensive food. We found this in the "Less is more" restaurant. At lunch we tasted the famous Bruges beer. A small bottle can tell that the smart people of Belgium have long realized: for the country to be successful and the people to be rich, the place for the green clown should be at most on the beer label.
When allocating time for travel, we practically avoid museums, because we have learned from our experience: museums take up a lot of time and often do not provide an opportunity to get to know the city itself. But the legs themselves brought us to this exhibition. The gallery, where many cute creatures are presented, made of brutal iron, made us very happy. We have photographed dozens of sculptures, here are some of them.
Many people compare Bruges with Venice, because this city also stands on the canals, over which 54 bridges are thrown, of which 12 are drawbridges. Canal riding is one of the key local attractions for tourists.
The gates of some courtyards, which go directly to the canal, look very unusual.
The places where the canals are widespread are chosen by restaurateurs who want to place tourists closer to the water.
There is a beauty in standing on the bridge and waving at passing pleasure boats, while looking at the bizarre architectural structures along the banks.
Since we had another goal of visiting Bruges, we could not allocate much time for simple contemplation and, along the way, photographing everything around us, we went through the city center to one very famous place.
This place is called "Basilica of the Holy Blood". A small two-story church that houses a Christian shrine: a few drops of the blood of Christ, which, according to legend, was collected by Joseph of Arimathea, who asked Pilate to remove the crucified body from the cross and buried it in a tomb that had previously been knocked out of the rock for Joseph himself. The exact date is known when the blood was brought to Bruges from the Second Crusade. It was April 7, 1150.
In the part of the church where the relic is located, it is not allowed to take pictures. The photo was taken from a distance from the next room. At the table sits a priest, in front of him on a table on a stand is a piece of cylindrical rock crystal, in an expensive frame, where you can see colored fragments.
For the sake of clarification, I would like to note that the sitting priest was a woman. This was the first time we encountered a female priest, so we were very surprised. But after rummaging on the Internet, we found out that the first female priest in the Christian world was ordained back in 1948 in the Anglican Church. And in the Catholic tradition, women have become priests since 2010, which is also quite a long time ago.
The famous basilica adjoins one wall to the city hall of the city of Bruges. The town hall looks great and is decorated with several brightly colored flags. We even looked inside. It was already evening, but surprisingly, the doors of the town hall were open. We did not enter as we were in a hurry for our evening train, which was supposed to take us back to Brussels.
On the way to the train station, we again crossed the market square, where, according to tradition, we took a picture near the stone lion.
We got to the Cathedral of St. Salvator, where we took a selfie and went to the railway station, which is just over a kilometer from "Salvator".
According to our impressions, Bruges is a city of "impulse tourism", when in the morning trains and buses bring here hundreds or even thousands of tourists, who in the late afternoon disperse to their places of permanent deployment 😊 and the streets are empty, except for the main tourist attractions. If you do not plan to visit museums and galleries, of which there are enough, and do not set yourself the task of finding all the locations for the filming of the film "Bringing Down in Bruges", then one day will be enough to explore this city, provided that you love walk a lot (like us) 😊😊😊
We hope you enjoyed our adventures in Bruges. And we, promoting our motto:
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