10/09/25 Beer, Bells, Boats, and Bicycles in Brugge

Our room in Brugge was up in the attic of Le Nid du Prince, a building once owned by Joseph the Grand Prince of Chimay. Joseph, amongst other grand princely activities,  donated the land and developed the infrastructure to establish the Trappist Abbey of Scourmont. The Trappist Monks started brewing beer and that was why there were two bottles of gratis Trappist beer in our fridge.  Not being a beer drinker myself, it was left to Roger to drink both of them, a sacrifice he was willing to make.

Belgium was quite pedantic about how their beer was drunk: the temperature, the shape of glass, the alignment of the bottle.  Proper glasses were provided lest we (Roger) inadvertently break the rules and cause beer catastrophes.

All the beer drinking took place in the evening though, so let me fill you in on the day.

Fortified by a breakfast of tea and shortbread biscuits, we sallied forth on foot to explore the old town with our tourist caps firmly on our heads. There was so much to see and do, a large part of it designed to part us from our money, to the extent that Le Nid Du Prince had formally warned us not to get sucked into tourist traps.

Traps aside, the Markt Square was bursting with glorious old buildings dripping with gilt, gargoyles and other fantastical trappings. 

Grand municipal building.

Horse drawn carriages waiting for tourists.

Gold and Gothic in the same build.

Dominating it all was the 13th century, 83m high bell tower topped by a 47 bell carillon which, besides donging the hour and playing tunes on the quarter hour, played a whole concert every day from 1100 to noon. The time keeping tunes were automated but the concert was played by a real, live carrillonist who climbed the tower every day to play their part.

Did I climb the too-many steps to get deafened by the bells and look out over Brugges' maze of red tiled roofs punctuated by church spires and canals? Of course I did!

Old steps down, new (only a couple of centuries) steps up.

Strict staircase protocols. Which few obeyed, I might add.

One of 47.

And then we coughed up our tourist money for a boat ride through the canals with a quick download of history and a different perspective on the medieval houses that jostled each other beside the waters.

All these beautiful buildings were still there because the industrial revolution pretty much passed right on by Brugges, leaving it with minimal industry. As a result it survived WWII largely intact and voila, here we were today enjoying the results of not being worth bombing and subsequent assiduous preservation and maintenance work.

Turns out cobblestones are hard on the feet as well as wheelie bags, but there was too much exploring to be done to rest for long.  On hired bicycles we circumnavigated the old town, following canals all the way.

My ride.

There were windmills;

and bridges to gladden an engineers heart. Rotating bridges, roll-up draw bridges, conventional opening bridges, it was engineer heaven!

We rode home in the rain in the company of zooming commuter cyclists and then, because the life of an international tourist is a glamorous one, I did my laundry in the bathtub while Roger drank beer and contemplated how long his clothes could last without being washed. We retired to bed amidst festoons of drying clothes draped artfully over hand hewn 13th century beams and went to sleep to the goodnight chimes of the carillon.

Home for the last couple of nights: Le Nid du Prince, Brugge.