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St. Paul's Cathedral is beautiful, inside and out, and pretty emblematic of London's cityscape. Part of the reason it avoided complete destruction in the World Wars was because enemy air fleets recognized its use as a compass to locate different areas of the city. The Cathedral's dome was damaged, as well as all of the medieval glass blown out, but it still remains the second largest Cathedral dome in Europe after St. Peter's Basilica in Rome. We were able to climb over 200 stairs into the dome, which has an amazing whisper effect (a person can talk against the wall and by the magic of science, the sound is carried 360 degrees around the dome's edge - what a way to gossip!). Then we made it to the top where there is a great view of the city. You can see why the dome's prominence and central location made it such a great "compass."
View of green where Jenny and I had lunch!
The Thames,Millenium Bridge and ant people.
One of the Cathedral's towers and if you look hard, the London Eye and Southbank.
Now for Brussels! I spoke a little about our first day in my previous post but these are the pictures to go along. This is Grote Markt, or Grand Place (like everything in Brussels, it has two names - one Flemish, the other French). There restaurants and vendors here, as well as the Town Hall. Many of the buildings are old guild buildings, the most extravagant being the one on the left, belonging to probably the merchant guild. This area has a mix of architecture, especially since a lot of the building were rebuilt in the 17th century I think and because Spain once owned Brussels and the King built a palace here that he never used.
This enigmatic statue is Mannekin Pis, and is the symbol of the city's quirkiness. No one knows who first created him, because the statue is not the original but is recast every few decades. The first documented casting of a Mannekin Pis statue is from like the late 1500s, but it's possible he's been in Brussels longer. Unfotunately, the story behind his creation has also been lost to time. Now, locals and tourists alike create their own folk tales about him (my favorite is about a father who loses his son and promises to make a statue to him, based on whatever he is doing when he's found). The local historical society supposedly dresses him up everyday based on the holiday or time of year, but we only ever saw him in this sailor hat.
Chocolate, of course, is also a national export and here you can see further evidence of Brussels obsession with the peeing statue.
Belgian waffles in Belgium. Classic. These are the EXTREME touristy kind. I don't know that locals would ever want to eat these.
Our second day in Brussels, we went on a bike tour of the city. Our tour guide stands in front of a mural of Tin Tin, a very famous cartoon that came out of Belgium. These murals are everywhere, from run down neighborhoods to richer, touristy areas. Because the city is so small, the poor and the wealthy often rub shoulders, with the walls of one building literally touching the walls of another, yet having a 1000 euro disparity between their rents.
This was a gaudy prison built after Belgium obtained the Congo and became rich. It no longer serves as a prison or much of anything really these days, but there is talk that it could be used as a museum and arts complex.
View of the city + lovely blue sky!
Garden. I don't remember where. The statues are supposed to be important historical figures.
Statue of a "shemale" duck, located outside of a very high end shopping area. I don't get it.
Brussels is also the capital of the EU. That's lady Europa, a goddess of the Earth I think, the euro, and the flags of all the countries that make up the union.
The business-y EU district. Shiny!
Cool monument in a park somewhere. Those ominous clouds look gorgeous right now, but the basically ruin the rest of our trip in the days ahead.
The city Royal Palace, where the prince of Belgium lives (the king lives in the countryside). Next door is the BelVUE, a pretty neat history museum, preserving the history of Brussels and Belgium in general.
Ummm...important cathedral? The statue in front is also important for reasons I've forgotten.
Random park sculptures. Brussels is weird.
This is the Atomium. It has nine orbs, each containing three floors of exhibits, restaurants, relics of the Belgian World's Fair, etc., to represent an atom of iron magnified 165 billion times. At the time, it was built without the aid of computers (!!!) and was meant to stand for the nine districts of Brussels. But when it was finished, there were only a eight districts and now there are only five, so it hasn't been as symbolic as it hoped it would be. Still pretty cool though.
Random. From a distance, I thought this was the King's Palace, which we hiked through a park's forest to get to, but it's just a pavillion. A beautiful structure nonetheless. Also, check out that plane trail.
The King's Palace! The Royal Gardens and estate are only open to the public three weeks out of the year, so it's amazing that we got to be here for it. So, of course, the moment after I take this picture, my camera dies. The next three days in Belgium are, for all you know, a lie but I'll try my best to describe them.
Here are somethings ripped off of Jenny from the gardens and from Bruges.
The King decided his royal gardens needed a Japanese pagoda so...
The Museum of Musical Instruments! To escape the rain on day three, we visited some museums, first the Bozar to look at Flemish art, then checking out these groovy musical inventions. They gave you headphones that picked up radio signals near different exhibits so that you could hear what the instrument actually sound like when played. I'm jamming to the funky accordion beats.
Jenny and I thought this player trumpet quartet (like a self-playing piano but with trumpets) was fantastic.
Jenny and I hamm and get a great view of the city in the museum complex.
Beurs, or Bourse, the old stock exchange building. Locals use it as a meeting point, and we ate a few of our dinners on these steps.
Chocolate dragon needs no caption. OMG, we ate so much chocolate.
Not included in these pictures, unfortunately, is our night out to Celtica, a ridiculous tourist bar where we actually saw the hen party (British slang for bachelorette party) that was travelling on our train. Jenny tried some Belgian beer, and Mollie and I jammed to the live entertainment - a really old, snarky man singing Bob Dylan.
On the fourth day, we took a day-trip out to Bruges, a gorgeous small town in the Belgium countryside, about an hour by train outside of Brussels. As you can tell, it's very cold, very grey, and rather rainy. Our first stop was to the city walls to see the so called traitor's skull at Smedenpoort (he opened the gate's to the enemy in 1688), but we couldn't find it. This is Burg, I think, a square nicknamed "The Govenor's Carwash" by locals because of the architecture.
This is Markt, the main square. Storm clouds = :( We spent most of our time in this area, eating or drinking chocolate.
We also visited two churches: the Church of Our Lady that has a Madonna with Child statue by Michelangelo and the Holy Blood, where we attempted to see the relic of the same name but failed.
Sint-Janhaus-Mill Windmills! One of the higher points in Bruges. Good panorama, really, really fierce wind.
The last day! We spent our last shebang eating (what else) waffles and chocolate. I got to visit The Museum of Costumes and Lace, which featured an exhibit on 1960s fashion - so wonderful! I gathered so much inspiration from the bright colors, prints and funky hats. There was even an original Skipper doll (of the Barbie variety), which premiered in the sixties. For good luck, Jenny and I rub this statue in Grand Place. We listened to a tour guide explain the story in French, but we could only gather that it was really important to touch her from head to foot.
It gets super crowded with tourists, hence Jenny's flurry.
I hope you have lived vicariously through me! Kisses!
