Holland & Belgium Viking River Cruise
Day 2: Saturday, October 26, 2024 - Travel and Brussels, Belgium
The day's statistics:
- Weather: upper 50s
- Steps: 16,874 Linda; 18,306 Steve
- Miles traveled (approximately): 1,946
Just after midnight, after the last meal, we tried to get some sleep. I dozed a little - very little -
but Linda wasn't so lucky and passed some of the time watching the movie 27 Dresses and a couple
episodes of Big Bang Theory.
Without adjusting for the time zones in flight - and merely four hours since our last meal -
we were once again served food. This time it was an egg, ham, and cheese sandwich.
At 1:00 AM ET we landed, and were at the gate in seven minutes.
We turned off airplane mode and our devices synched to the local time - it was just after 7:00 AM.
We passed through customs with no issues, collected our luggage and made our way out of the terminal.
Upon landing in Belgium, we arrived at the 16th
country we've visited, and the first of this trip.
When we exited the terminal, we found our Viking airport contact Peter.
He was chatting with our driver about the fact that there was another flight just minutes behind ours, and we
would wait a couple minutes for the other passengers to arrive.
Everyone was eventually assembled with their luggage, and we headed to the shuttle.
We spent our shuttle time chatting with Yvonne and Juan, a couple from Florida.
Before we knew it we were at the hotel as it was about a half-hour ride to the hotel.
This was the first day of our extension - day(s) added to the actual cruise to enhance the travel experience. Our actual
Holland & Belgium cruise didn't start until day 4 of our journey.
Tanya, our local Viking guide, met us at the hotel, the Steigenberger Wiltcher's. We stepped inside.
We checked in and, fortunately, our rooms were actually available. We grabbed our luggage and headed
up to the room.
The bathroom had a black-and-white motif.
At 10:00, most of the travelers that were doing the Brussels Extension gathered in the lobby for an orientation walk.
I participated while Linda napped due to the lack of sleep while on the plane.
We had a rather short walk almost around the block, but primarily it was to point out shopping points -
such as a pharmacy or other shops - as well as restaraunts.
On the first corner after the first intersection was a famous bakery called Paul, with a line out the door.
As we passed one of the restaurants, we learned that beef and beef stew were staples in this area, as were mussles. And
the proper way to eat mussels - one of the many staples of this region - served by the bucket, is to use a fork to remove
the meat from the first shell, but then use that shell sort of like a pair of tongs for all the rest.
We also passed a focaccia [think pizzaria] called Scopa that sold focacca [think pizza] for between €8 to €12.
This seemed to be a rather quiet section of the city.
I went to the room after the walk.
After a little relaxing, Linda and I walked to church a little bit away to see if and when there may be service.
While about 80% of Belgium is Catholic, there are far fewer that are actually practicing.
Along the way to the church, we passed a few points of interest that included a ferris wheel, World War II Memorial,
and some other general sights.
It was shortly before 1:00 when we arrived at Notre-Dame des Victoires Onze-Lieve-Vrouw ter Zege Church, or
Our Lady of the Victories, Our Lady of the Blessing Church.
(The original collection of pictures was taken with a cell phone as we were only supposed to visit the church to see if there
was even a service offered - but wound up going inside. We returned on day 3 and
took most of the pictures again with the camera.)
Some of these may look like duplicates, but they are zooms of other pictures to show details.
Some of these are particularly interesting, such as the sun rays in the smoke, and the stained glass window light casts.
After nearly 20 minutes we headed out.
Across the street from the church was a park, surrounded by statues.
We passed this on the way back to the hotel too.
I earlier spied a McLaren - our first exotic - as it buzzed past on the same road this Ferarri Testarosa was spotted.
A little bit later, a Porsche 911 Cabriolet passed by too - three exotics in a few minutes.
There is a "Who's On First" style joke out there somewhere wherein this hotel is the punch line.
Near the Paul bakery - about four doors down - was a Courfour marketwhere we bought a light dinner consisting
of salad, cheese, bread, wine, and chocolate for dessert.
We drank the wine and noticed how fruity it tasted. But why the wine section in the store included non-alcoholic
wine we'll never know.
We ate our meal around 2:00.
With the jet lag and lack of decent sleep, we were really dragging our wagons.
Our notes pretty much end on this day with "rest". It was over a month ago and the best we can think is that we just
took it easy and went to bed early.
At least we didn't wake up in the middle of the night asking each other "Are you awake?" as we had on previous trips...