My deepest and sincerest apologies for not updating sooner. Its been one heck of a crazy semester which makes updating difficult. That, and the sad fact that I lost all pictures from spring break...but that is besides the point. Belgium came back to me...and I'll be getting London pictures soon enough to be posted. Therefore, sit tight!
I'll start off with the first 3 days of spring break in Belgium with Connie and Nick. Let me tell you, I didn't know exactly what to expect from this decision but it wound up being a very very good one. Leuven, Brussels, and Bruges are amazing places...and so completely different from Roma that is was a very very good change.
Connie and I left Rome at the ungodly hour of 4:30? Well, at least that's when we left for the airport. We got into Brussels and met up with Nick around 10 (from what I remember) and made it to Leuven with no unfortunate experiences. It all ran incredibly smoothly...other than the fact that we were incredibly exhausted. Nick showed us around Leuven all day - my first experience with a Belgium waffle was that morning for breakfast. They're a lot better in the country that they are named for.
YUMMY!
That's Connie and I on one of the bridges in Leuven. That was still early in the morning.
(from left) Me, Nick, and Connie in the little area of the town where women were made to stay during some point. I don't really remember exactly where we were. But it was fun. We balanced my camera on a bench and timed the picture. It came out pretty cute I think.
We continued our journey through the city before ending the afternoon with bowling...and sadly dinner from an Italian restaurant. Don't worry, we made up for that the next day.
After dinner, we hung out with a few of the other kids studying in Leuven with Nick. They were all incredibly nice and very entertaining. By the way...bowling in Belgium, not one of my finer bowling performances...
Saturday was Brussels. One of my favorite cities that I've seen thus far. Even with the cloudy weather/rain...it was still very enjoyable. We even had the traditional Belgium meal for lunch...mussels, chicken (me), beef (nick), and rabbit (Connie), and ice cream...YUMMY! We also saw about every church that there was in the city. All of them were so amazing and beautiful. I liked to just sit and take in the surroundings.
All images from the day in Belgium...and here are some of my delicious lunch!
After a long day in Brussels, we headed back to Leuven with the high hopes of having another fun night out...but with the constant walking came exhausted kids at night. So, we opted to take out a pizza (from Pizza Hut - and I know how sad that seems) and watch Saved before going to bed.
We spent Sunday in Bruges...a small city that had a lot of character. Its a shame that it rained the entire day...well, the majority of the entire day. We saw a few more churches and I even got touch a relic! A REAL RELIC! Rather impressive I thought. The only bad thing about the day was the weather, but we stuck it out and enjoyed ourselves anyway.
For dinner, we met up with Craig! We went to eat and then hung out for a little bit before heading to one of the Irish pubs in the area that they seem to go to frequently. It was fun because one of the Irish men that works for their program sat and talked to us for a long long while. His Irish brogue was very appealing...and he was hilarious!
Monday, we spent the morning wandering around Leuven before having to head to Brussels to catch our train to London.
All in all, I'd say that Belgium was quite a successful trip and made for a very good first third of spring break. I had a lot of fun with Connie and Nick and seeing Craig and meeting new people!
I'll update about London soon so that I can get into the Barcelona kids visit and Northern Italy by the end of the week! YAY!
Ciao!
