Day 2 - Brussels and Waterloo Experience

Sunday 28th August - Sunrise 6:51am – Sunset 8:36pm

Weather Forecast: 25c partly cloudy

Steps: 11,397     7.86 kl.

About our TD and driver. Sharon Tooman is our TD and our driver is Jan (pronounced as Yarn) and he is from Belgium. Sharon is originally from New Zealand. She used to work in the medical field as a Hematologist but came to Europe 22 years ago for a short while and hasn’t managed to move back to NZ. She was first involved with Contiki Tours but has been working for Insight for the past 16 years. She was saying that she lived in the UK for about 10 years but now lives in the south of France.

Today’s adventures. 

Another early morning for me and I was down for breakfast at 6:45am.  The breakfast spread in this hotel is very good.

Our excursion today, took us to the Waterloo Battlefield site of June 1815, where the 2 armies of the Seventh Coalition, an Anglo led Allied army under the command of the Duke of Wellington and a Prussion army under the command of the Prince of Wahlstatt, Gebhard Leberecht von Blucher, defeated the French Army, under the command of Napolean Bonaparte. 

Last year was the 200^th anniversary of the battle and the museum opened a new display and exhibition about the battle and a 4D movie, which was excellent. Actually, the whole museum and presentation was very well done. 

I managed to climb the 226 steps up to the top of the Lions Mound. 

The view of the surrounding countryside was impressive, although very windy up on the top.

There was a short re-enactment which I missed seeing, as I was up on top of the mound and the re-enactment was on the other side of the Panorama building there.

From there we returned to Brussels. We found a place to buy something for lunch and then walked back to the hotel.

The optional to Antwerp departed at 1pm. I visited Antwerp in August 2015, so gave that a miss. Instead, I had a quiet afternoon, catching up on some reading.

When the group returned at 5:30pm, Cindy and I then went for a walk, to see the Royal Palace. 

The Royal Palace of Belgium is one of the most beautiful official buildings in the capital, Brussels.

Standing opposite the Parliament building on the other side of the Royal Park, the Royal Palace symbolises our system of government, that is to say, a constitutional monarchy.

The Palace is the place where His Majesty the King exercises his prerogatives as Head of State. It is at the Palace that the King grants audiences and deals with affairs of state.

Apart from housing the offices of the King and the Queen, the Royal Palace also accommodates the services of the Chief of Cabinet to the King, the Intendant of the Civil List of the King, the Chief of the Military Household of the King , the Chief of Protocol of the Court, the Head of the Foreign Relations Department and the Head of the Petitions and Social Affairs Department .

The Palace also includes the State Rooms where large receptions are held, as well as the apartments provided for foreign Heads of State during official visits

On the way back to the hotel, I called into a small store in a small street and managed to buy some postage stamps. It’s very hard to find places that sell them here in Brussels. We called into the

same place to grab a bite to eat for dinner and then continued back to the hotel.

We are departing from Brussels tomorrow, so I’m having an early night tonight .

Day 1 - Welcome to Brussels

Saturday 27th August - Sunrise 6:49am – Sunset 8:38pm

Weather Forecast: 32c and humid

Steps:                 21,522       14.85 kl

I had a reasonable nights sleep last night but woke a bit earlier than I normally would. After trying to go back to sleep, I decided to just get up. Caught up on the laundry and sorted the suitcase.  

Room 312

Brussels is Belgium’s capital and home to the headquarters of the European Union. The ornate Grand

Place at the heart of the city has shops and cafes inside 17th-century guild houses and the intricate Gothic Hôtel de Ville (town hall) with its distinctive bell tower. The 19th-century Maison du Roi houses the Musée de la Ville de Bruxelles history museum, including costumes for the city’s Manneken-Pis statue.

I had arranged to meet Cyndy at 9am and we headed out walking.  We only managed to visit a few of the places that I had on my walking itinerary, as the map was a little deceptive.

Palais de Justice under scaffold

The Palace of Justice is the Supreme Court of Law for Belgium. Commissioned by King Leopold II it was built between 1866 and 1883 by architect Joseph Poelaert in a neo-classical/eclectic design.  The main controversy of the Palais de Justice was the fact that 3,000 homes in the Marolles-Sablon area had to be demolished to make way for it. The people of the area were so furious. In return they defiled the building on the day it was open to the public and the word ‘architect’ has become a derogatory term; ‘schieven architek’ (twisted architect).

Place du Petit Sablon

The Petit Sablon Square is surrounded by Gothic columns with little bronze statues on top. 

They represent the ancient professions. 48 professions are illustrated in this way.  Four statues are crowned: the masons, the stone-cutters, the sculptors and the slate-quarry workers. On a small height, a monument and 10 big statues can be found. The monument, of Flemish neo-renaissance style, was realized by Fraikin in 1864. It represents the counts of Egmont and Hornes who were executed on the scaffold on 5 June 1568 because of their resistance to the Spanish tyranny. The monument had been set up on the Grand-Place at first, in front of the Maison du Roi, the place of the execution. It was transferred to the Petit Sablon in 1879.

Church of our Blessed Lady of the Salon.

Place du Grand Sablon.  There was an art market being held there, so no photos.

Madame Chapeau, who wasn't on my list

Manneken Pis

The Town Hall.

The Grand Place.

 And Het Zinneke. 

We were back at the hotel around 2pm. Very hot & humid, so another shower and change of clothes, before meeting the rest of the group at 4:30.  We all then boarded the bus and headed to The Grand Place. After Sharon spoke for a while, we had free time before meeting again for our welcome dinner at one of the restaurants on the square. Far too much food. Drank 1 beer and lots of water. The temp peeked at 30c today. Very hot for this part of Europe. Only 20 people on the tour, so won’t be long before we all get to know each other.

We were back at the hotel shortly after 8:30pm.

Heading out again at 8:45am tomorrow.

Arrival

There were only 2 other planes lined up in Dubai, when we departed. 

 but 5 or 6 out of Heathrow and we waited while another 4 took off ahead of us. 

I finally made it to the Sofitel Brussels Le Louise Hotel about 3 hours ago. 

Caught up with my travel friend Cyndy and am now heading to bed for a good nights sleep. Might add some photo's to this post tomorrow.

Countdown on

I received an email from the SOFITEL Brussels Le Louise earlier this evening, re my pre tour booking. Hopefully the information that I supplied to them, will make my check in easier, NOT that I have ever had a problem checking into any hotel, pre tour. I usually arrive in the morning BUT this time, my flight doesn't arrive until 6:35pm, so I'm not sure if I'll have a jet lag problem or not. I haven't suffered from jet lag, since my first overseas tour, back in 2000.

I also received an email from my Tour Direct for my first tour, Country Roads of Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands, with some info about the first couple of days. Only 20 people on this tour. I'm happy about that. 

Tour Documents

At long last I have been able to pick up all my tour documents. Insight have been very slack re the issue of the itinerary for the Mystical Heart of Europe tour and only issued them yesterday. When checking the itinerary, I noticed that there has been a change on Day 3. Nothing too dramatic. We were supposed to visit Fuzer Castle in Hungary but that has been changed to the Betliar Manor House.