Our stay in Brussels was short. The main reason we came to Brussels was to drop off our car, and take the Eurostar train back to London. However, even though we only had an afternoon and evening to see the sights, we made the best of our time.
(Click on the Images to Enlarge)
We took advantage of summer rates at the
Hotel Metropole, Brussels’ most acclaimed hotel. Over 100 years old, the
Metropole has an extraordinarily elegant lobby, truly fancy restaurants, and
uniformed bellboys at your every beck and Euro. Our room could only be
described as ‘vast.’ The bedroom alone was bigger than some single family
houses I have been in. We each took chairs at opposite corners of our room and
almost had to speak up to be heard. It was quite a place. We took a glance at
the hotel menu, and with a full meal running more than 100 Euros per person, we
decided to look for something more proletarian.
Away
from the hotel, we walked a few blocks
to
The Grand Place, the medieval heart of Brussels. The name doesn’t do it
justice. Filled with people, the Grand Place is a huge square surrounded by
exquisite medieval buildings that once were home to all of the main Guilds of
the country. Now, they are fine restaurants and museums, with chocolatiers,
Belgian lace shops, and good pubs right at ground level. We sampled one open
air pub, looked in a couple of souvenir shops, and when the afternoon rain
decided to pour down, we ducked into a used record store. As the evening came
to us, we returned to the hotel for our last night on the continent.