Bikes Everywhere!

The bike culture of Germany, Belgium, and especially the Netherlands is impressive.  In Germany, I started noticing separate lanes for bikes - often with a divider between the road and the bike lane.  Much safer than Pittsburgh, that's for sure.

As we continued northward, I noticed the emphasis on bikes more and more - parking lots of bikes, bikes chained to every available surface, and more.  Brugge had parking for bikes near a music event.  There was no parking for cars anywhere in sight.

But the Netherlands truly had bikes everywhere:

There are sidewalks for walkers separate from bike paths for bikes (and scooters apparently) separate from the road for cars - pretty impressive!

Many bikes have saddlebags since people use them to do their shopping:

And there are some truly huge parking lots for bikes:

This huge 2.5-level structure is a bike parking lot in Amsterdam near the train station.

Here's a close up of one end of the parking lot:

Bikes are also modified to transport multiple children (and apparently cost several thousand dollars):

It was also common for one person to be peddling a bike while another was sitting side-saddle on the back, although I didn't manage to get a photo of that.

I also loved this parking garage for bikes in Haarlem:

So take note, Pittsburgh, you may be bike friendly, but you've got nothing on these countries.  

Brugge: The City of Beer, Chocolate, and Frites

Brugge was sweet.  Quite literally.  We ate a lot of sweets there, including waffles:

with whipped cream - Paul preferred this one

with chocolate - I preferred this one

and delicious chocolates:

This particular bag was from The Chocolate Line, which is known for its odd chocolate flavors.  Paul tried:

• Apple, which was described as "Caramel with apple balsamic vinegar and a praline with 'Granny Smith' green apple
• Paola: "Gianduja with a crown of caramelized hazelnuts"
• Piaf: "Marzipan with pieces of orange marinated in Cointreau"

I tried to be a bit more adventurous with:

• Earl Grey: "Milk chocolate ganache with Earl Grey tea"
• Chili: "Bitter ganache and marzipan with slightly smoked 'Espelette' chilli pepper"
• Miss Piggy: "Milk chocolate with almond praline and cripsy bacon with quinoa" - If you look closely, you can see this one in the picture.  It has a little pig face on it and says "bacon."

We both agreed that they were all quite delicious.  We opted not to try the cigar chocolate that contained tobacco leaves or the one that contained fried onion or the one labelled "Wasabi."  There was also one with a marijuana leaf on it in the store, but I don't see that one in the brochure.  Hmmm....

Don't worry, though, we got plenty of exercise to work off all this food.  The Airbnb place at which we stayed had two loaner bikes, so we took a ride around town:

All the park benches in Brugge seem to have dragons as supports - pretty neat!

Then we biked out into the countryside

And saw some sheep:

On our way back, the bridge was up.  Paul was amused at this unique method of raising a bridge:

Later, we took a boat tour of the canals

Paul claimed a monastery (as if he weren't already winning Carcassonne):

And we toured a brewery

that had a great view

And finally, we really liked this parking lot for bikes - clearly the best way to get around Brugge:

Brussels with Friends

After two months of hotels, hostels, and B&Bs, we decided to try Airbnb. Hotels always feel unnecessarily fancy, overpriced, and actually provide few services other than a place to sleep. With Airbnb we could get a kitchen and a more comfortable place for down time (i.e. to write blog posts).

We decided to rent a small apartment for 4 days near the center of Brussels. We showed up at the appointed location and time. Met the owners and got the keys. They were very friendly and helpful---pointing out the nearest grocery store and offered to answer any questions we had. The place was as-advertised. We were very excited.

Sadly, their alarm system malfunctioned the first morning of our stay. It kept going off and they were unable to disable it. Not their fault, but definitely a little stressful for us. They found us a hotel to stay in our second night, drove us there, and refunded us the entire stay. Can't complain about that!

We then moved to another Airbnb apartment for our final two nights in Brussels. Again, the owners responded quickly to our inquiry and were extremely welcoming. We loved it.

My gradschool friend, Nico, is from Belgium. He connected me with his father, Jorge, a resident of Brussels. Jorge offered to personally show us around town. After spending some time with Jorge, I now know where Nico got his hospitality and love of food. Jorge insisted on giving us a driving tour North of the city our first night. I later went back with the metro and took some photos:

The Atomium.

Brussels basilica.

He also pointed out the residence of the Belgian king, although I didn't get a picture.

He then took us out for an excellent Italian dinner. The food was wonderful.

The next morning he met us bright and early and took us on a 12 hour walking tour of the city. We saw beautiful guild halls from the 1600s, ate the famous frites, drank cherry (Kriek) beer, saw parks, goverment buildings, EU buildings, and had a delicious traditional Belgian dinner (mussels and carbonade flamande).

Cookies!

Cherry beer (Kriek) at "La Mort Subite" (the subtle death), which is an old bar that's been run by the same family for four generations.

Guild hall.

Art Noveau architecture.

King's office/palace.  It's good to be the king.

Frites! (Thick fries fried twice to make sure the vitamins are sealed in.)

The next day we met up with our friends Nels and Brianne to visit Antwerp. We went to the modern art museum. Brianne helped us understand what we were looking at.

We had more beer (Belgium is famous for beer) and walked around town.

An interesting public art display.

The Antwerp central train station is a really neat building. There are several floors of train tracks under the building.

On our last day Kate wasn't feeling well, so she stayed at our Airbnb place to rest while I toured the city on my own. I dropped in on the Google Brussels office (everyone was super friendly. Thanks!), and went back to a few sites to take pictures (included above).