Hello people and pinmapplers!
We are finishing our trip throughout Belgium, a trip in which we have seen the best-known and most beautiful cities in the country, the most famous: Ghent and Bruges, but we left a lot behind. There are other interesting ones that we visited quickly, including the northern coast to return to the country's capital: Brussels.
A peculiar city located in a region with a language different from that of the city, where they also regularly coexist with English and many of the other European languages. And at the same time, the past, mainly Gothic and stone, coexists there with the present, modern glass buildings and a lot of metal.
And we have time to visit some of its most emblematic places, possibly the heart of the city is in the Grand Place, the main square marked around it by charming and beautiful buildings, with profuse Gothic decorations and a lot of order. In particular, the City Hall building itself stands out with the country's flag that stands out among the gray, the stone and the sky. Because here the sky is like that, it competes in ashen color with the architecture itself.
But some already seem even more baroque, they stand out and even shine with more golden decorations, more statuettes in niches and columns, and we look surprised at those motley facades that can no longer contain even one more detail, there is no space.
Some even contain more figurines in the upper part, at the top, as if the artist saw that he had no more room and it would be better to put them higher up than not to put them, and it is also a way to decorate those pointed ends of those very curious facades.
Then we find more grandiose facades of the same tones, the city's churches, among which the beautiful church of Saint Catherine with a large central rose window stands out, and of course the most important of all, the Cathedral of Saint Michael and Saint Gudula. This one, with its two symmetrical towers and its elongated pointed windows, reminds us a little of Notre-Dame in Paris, right?
We continue walking around and there is a place to take shelter from the cold humidity that also deserves our attention, a beautiful and long glass gallery shelters us, the Saint Hubert Gallery. A very chic and elegant commercial space in which to browse stores or have a drink like a Belgium beer or a hot Belgium chocolate maybe...
But we forget something, something important that we cannot stop seeing, the symbol of the city. That naughty boy turned into a fountain, in a corner that is always full of people to look up and see that famous trickle of water falling, the Manneken Pis. And of course we greet him before to leave…
Although before we leave we have to go through that other modern part of the city, that area where all the European buildings are located, like the European Parliament made of glass. Because it could unfortunately be said that it is the capital of Europe, I say it that way because I believe that Europe is much more of a neighborhood in this city with modern buildings full of bureaucrats with exorbitant salaries who are passing laws according to the pressure lobbies with more money, the usual... but that's another topic.
The issue now is that we are quickly leaving the city because we have other plans, the eastern part of the country, a charming and charming city on the edge of a calm river, Dinant, and very close to there, we are going to a Belgian castle and a party to which I was invited, so helping to prepare everything I couldn't take many more photos at that time, everything was quick, only afterwards... And we already know that "what happens in a Belgian castle, stays there, in the Belgian castle". 😉
Bruxelles, Belgium🇧🇪❤️Europe
More about Belgium here:
- Ghent: historic city of churches, towers and castles in Belgium
- Bruges: the enchanting museum city in Belgium