Day Three
Aug. 21, 2012
This was the day we planned for Belgium — Brugge to be exact. Mom woke us up early this morning to get ready and go to the hotel breakfast. I love European breakfasts. I mean, I will never — and I mean never — get used to UV milk. It is warm and nasty. However, I am quite a fan of little Babybel (or what I refer to as moo cow) cheeses smushed onto French bread. Yum!
May I just mention that, like Coca-cola, apparently, water is thought to be Gold here? Trying to get a large glass of water is like trying to get… I don’t know. But it’s hard.
After grabbing mini-Nutellas (it’s not that I like it, but other people get so happy when you give them a baby Nutella), cheese and some cute little jam containers, we got on the road to Brugge.
First, I’d like to reiterate my belief that the French are INSANE drivers. I probably said 15 million prayers while driving through traffic. I honestly think we only survived unscathed because of those prayers.
Lucky for us, we finally made it to the freeway when our GPS told us to “Continue straight for a long time.”
While going straight for a long time (because we’re very obedient people, you know), this white van decided to merge into us. Let me paint you a picture. We have driven most of the way to Brugge in the center lane on a three-lane freeway. In the back, left-hand blind spot there was a white van — like the ones with meat carcasses in the back (yes, we saw one of those. No, it does not make me want to be vegetarian. At the same time, no, it does not make me want to eat meat.). As I looked out my window, I noticed his blinker on. Please note, I noticed his front blinker — not the back one. I was about to tell my mother he was merging when I noticed him getting dangerously close to our car. So close, in fact, that the wind created from his car pushed our car a little bit out of our lane. Luckily, mom is an awesome driver, so she didn’t swerve. The van then proceeded to slow down, switch to the fast lane, speed up and get even with our window. I didn’t pay him much mind until I noticed he was paying us quite a bit. There were angry words yelled in a language I didn’t understand (thank goodness!) accompanied by some hand gestures I really hope weren’t inappropriate (shouldn’t he have been paying attention to the road?). In the States, if I had know what I’d done wrong, I would have apologized with some sort of half-sympathetic hand gesture and my best attempt at a sorry face. However, I was completely bewildered. He had almost slammed into our car and he was yelling at us. I chose to instead shrug my shoulders in “Where’s Waldo?” sort of way and shake my head. In hindsight, I really hope I didn’t do something offensive. Garrett hopes I did.
So here’s my request: If anyone knows the traffic laws in France, what the heck did we do wrong? I’d really like to know. Thanks.
We made it to Brugge (Hooray!) and got to our hotel. I’d like to first say that if our hotels keep getting larger at the same rate they are, we’ll be living in the Taj Mahal by the time we leave.
Anyway, Brugge is a really cool city to walk around in. That’s pretty much what we did. Garrett is a little disappointed we couldn’t see the peeing boy statue, but we’re pretty sure that’s not in this city.
One site I would like to focus on was in the middle of one of the busiest squares in the city. For some reason, they have these huge bleacher things in the middle and people were sitting on them. However, this one couple wasn’t just sitting. Oh no, they were making out — and they were getting at it. I couldn’t help but stare — who does that! I know I’m Mormon and should be encouraging people to wait for marriage and all, but come on! These people needed a room.
Anyway, here’s the food rundown:
We ate at this chicken place in the square, Garrett had chicken, Mom spoiled me with mussels and she had a salad.
We got Belgian chocolate at a shop.
Haagen-Dazs ice-cream at the Haagen-Dazs store (can you believe they don’t have peanut butter here!?)
Belgian Waffles in Belgium, with strawberries and whipped cream.
Yum!
Okay, here’s the best part (not really, but I liked it), as we were wandering around the city, we came across this GIANT play place in the middle of a residential area. The kid in all of us (including Mom!) came out and we all took a turn sliding down it. It was pretty sweet.
(Oh my goodness! I just realized I never got a picture of the slide! Sorry!)
We’re now back at the hotel, sweet and sound. My feet are killing me, but this has been great. Now off to bed before adventures in the morning!
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