Eurotrip 2011

Busses, trains, metro, green green trees and more than 250 beers. This is Belgium and definitely a place where I can see myself live. We arrived in Brussels on Friday the 15th to find a gorgeous loft apartment on Lombard street. Nick even stocked the fridge for us :) A sneaky blue door across from city centre cafe is the entrance to our building. A single staircase with dodgy green carpeting leads up to the third door where our apartment awaits. The interior looks like something out of a movie. The type of place I always wanted to live in.













Brussels is a beautiful city with cute little places around every corner. Noelle picked us up from the airport and took us downtown to Nick's little spot of Heaven. We were introduced and immediately went for a cold kriek downstairs. Noelle had to go to work and Nick went to the beach for the weekend so giz and I took the streets exploring. We discovered grand place and a few shops and stopped at quite a few watering holes for delicious Belgian beer. At one stage we got really hungry and stopped for some food and realised it was 21:30. The sun was still high in the sky - definitely something to get used to.
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Day 2

Brugge. We woke up early morning, had starbucks for breakfast and boarded the train to Brugge. An hour later we arrived to a soaking wet little place and our first expense for the day were umbrellas :) Brugge is gorgeous but seeing that I left my lonely planet at home we didn't really know exactly where to go so we just walked around exploring and taking pictures.







Naturally we stopped to enjoy frieten with mayo and our favorite: coke :) we were really pushed for time as we had to get back to brussels to get ready for laura and nadeems wedding. The wedding was about half an hour out of the city. We had 20 minutes to get ready and then took a cab to Jessica's house. Jess is one of Laura's school friends and was so kind to offer us a ride there and back. Luckilly otherwise we would've never found it. We were an hour late but luckily caught the last of the ceremony and saw the kiss :)

The reception was held at .... A beautiful old setting. The bride's father, brother and a few other friends were dressed in quilts and most of the indian ladies wore sahri's. The cultural diversity was incredible as they had guests from all the continents in the world. 180 guests were served plated starters, mains and desserts and could enjoy an open bar the whole evening. It was very special spending their big night with them in the middle of nowhere in Belgium.

Laura and Nadeem seated us with some of their Kenyan friends. It was a perfect combination, everybody got to know each other straight away and we had great laughs. O and I caught the bouquet :)

After dancing in heels all night and lots of great food we got to bed at 04:30 exhausted!





Day 3



Kortrijk. We decided to take it easy and sleep in a bit. Grabbed some breakfast at Plattesteen restaurant across the street and once again headed off to grand central station. When we finally made it to Kortrijk is was past three. I haven't been back to Kortrik since I've first been in 2002. You can just imagine the excitement!!



We arrived in a complete ghost town with miserable weather. Apparently Kortrijk is not the place to go to on a Sunday. We walked around and I tried to find my way - actually I did not know where to go at all. I remembered the place totally different. To be honest I was a little dissapionted. The place looks like it needed a bit of TLC. We had a beer and a pancake each and waited for Lucas to pick us up. The whole day was a bit overwhelming. I've always been excited about returning to Kortrijk because of all the great memories. And now that I've been back I couldn't remember anything, but still the memories came flooding. Super weird feeling.

It was a bit better when I saw Lucas. Tons and tons of great memories came to me at that moment, but it was good seeing him cause he is still the same. I haven't seen him since 2003, but we've always stayed in touch. He took us to his old house in Zonnekeer street and then to Nathalie's house in Parkietenlaan where I stayed in 2002. It was so surreal seeing those houses and remembering all we did there. He then showed us the school and we laughed about our good times.

By the time our little tour was over the weather was really crappy and it was raining. Lucas took us to his house where we had some wine and had time to catch up. I got to see his parents and 5 of his brothers and sisters. They are 7 kids!! His parents even remembered me. Was quite special :)

Thanks Lucas xx




We couldn't stay very long, so after our catch up and looking at his pictures from his trip to SA he took us back to the station. We needed to get back to brussels to meet Melinda. I was really excited as I haven't seen her in a while. She now lives in Holland.

Melinda arrived and we took her to the apartment for beers, toast and a long overdue catch up session.

Day 4




Gent. Every year Gent hosts a festival for all shapes and sizes for ten days and approximately 1000 500 people visit this festival every year. On average each person drinks on litre of beer a day.

Again we had starbucks for breakfast on the train and 40 minutes later we arrived in gent. We walked around for a bit and not knowing which way the festival was we stopped to ask a very nice lady who ended up handing us loads of maps.


Before we found the festival grounds we managed to fit in some shopping time at H&M and Zara and we took a boat trip through the city.




The weather was terrible once again so we stopped for soup and waffles for lunch. Frederic my friend from way back when came to join us and showed us around. We had a few beers with him and caught up for a while. Frederic is the only one of my Belgian friends that I've actually seen more than twice in the last 9 years. It was awesome seeing him and spending the day with him. Unfortunately we couldn't stay for the party at night as we needed to get back to Brussels. It would have been awesome to stay. The whole place was buzzing and the vibe was incredible. We learnt that Frederic and 5 of his friends are the organisers for the Student Kick off festival every year. They started it 6 years ago, so next year I'll have to make a plan to go back and visit!

Frederic you are awesome!!!!

Day 5

Our last day in Brussels was a super lazy one. We got up really late, skipped breakfast and spent our time trying to pack all our things in. What a mission!

We met up with nathalie for lunch at the pub just downstairs from our flat. It was great seeing her and catching up. When I went to Belgium in 2002, her family was my host family for a week. Thanks for taking off work to come have lunch with us :)


Melinda went to the airport straight after lunch and giz and I did a shopping round one last time.

It was so sad saying goodbye to our awesome apartment and our time in Belgium. The whole weekend was super special, and one that I will definitely not forget anytime soon!!

Super thanks to:
Noelle for arranging our accommodation and for picking us up at the airport and a quick beer.
Nic for owning the best apartment in Belgium and for letting us stay there!
Lucas for picking us up in Kortrijk and inviting us to his house and giving us wine :)
Frederic for showing us Gent and buying us liters of Kriek :) and last but not least Nathalie for the delish lunch! You guys rock!! Xxx

Next stop: Athens!