The breakfast we had at the Antwerp Hilton was one of the best buffet style hotel breakfasts ever.  It had so much good stuff, and I really liked the breakfast room, situated on ground level looking over the square next to the hotel.  I thoroughly stocked up for the day, that’s for sure. After getting ourselves set to go, we left our bags in with reception and went out looking for the museum of Peter Paul Rubens, Rubenshuis. We thought we knew roughly where it was, so trundled off, but we weren’t quite right, and even though we saw a bit more of Antwerp, we got there with the help of a lady who saw us finally take out our map. We found the Belgians to be very friendly people.  The museum was very impressive.  You got to appreciate just how amazing that man was, how ground-breaking, hard-working and enterprising he was, and of course his amazing talent and vision.  It was a very interesting look back in time, and it was good to see that an artist in those times could be very affluent indeed. There were some excellent works on display, and a couple of interesting juxtapositions of two paintings of the same subject done by Rubens and by his workshop.  It is difficult to tell between the two, which shows how well he had them trained up.  The garden was nice too.  We had a good wander around, and then walked back to the hotel via the main drag again, looking in a couple of shops along the way.  

Then it was off to Brussels!  We grabbed our bags and cabbed it back to the station, then jumped on a train to the capital. This one was a bit more crowded even in first class, but we were still able to sit with our big suitcases in the space opposite. It was a bit longer a ride, but still relatively quick.  We arrived early in the afternoon, and our first task was to get our bearings and walk to our hotel, because we knew we were pretty much within walking distance.  We started in a couple of directions and eventually asked someone, and she showed us which way, and we turned out to be literally within just a couple of hundred metres of it.

Our room was ready so we went right in a flopped for a bit, then we went out and had a look at the lie of the land.  The main square was pretty close and we made for that, but on the way we came across a very nice arcade, Galerie Royales Saint-Hubert, which reminded us of one in Milan, long and tall with a skylight all along, and arched. It was pretty classy and had a lot of nice shops in it, some of which we went into.   We then went on to the main square, the Grand Place. As the name would suggest, it’s very grand, with very rich looking old buildings all around, with lots of gold leaf and carving in the facades.  We had a look the Museum of Brussels, which had many relics of past ages from the city, and lots of paintings of earlier times, plus a pretty impressive set of models of the city in miniature from previous eras.  It was pretty good! We wandered around for a while, then walked up towards the cathedral to the east of the centre. Unfortunately it was closed by the time we got there, but we had a walk around it and admired the external architecture. We liked our first impression of Brussels. It’s stylish and historic, and very busy.  

We walked around for a while longer, and stopped at a cafe for a coffee and a bit of chocolate (being compelled to try some of the local specialty!).  After a bit we went back to the hotel and rested up for a spell before getting ready for dinner.  I was checking the websites pretty avidly at this point because at any time there could be news of political change at home. It’s a good thing our hotel, the Novotel, had good wifi! We thought maybe we should do the square thing again, though we knew the food wouldn’t necessarily be its main attraction.  We decided to risk it since it was our second last night. We decided on Paon de Pauro, in the northern corner of the square. We weren’t wrong about the food, but the atmosphere was magic. We both had the schnitzel. Of course it didn’t get dark until very late, so we took the opportunity to have dessert and coffee at a little cafe in Galerie Royales Saint-Hubert, before strolling back to the Grand Place to see the buildings beautifully lit up. It was a really enjoyable evening, topped off with a Cointreau at a bar as the lights were working their magic. Stunning.  Brilliant day.  We went back to the hotel and flopped.

Rubenshuis    Brussels