A Mexican, a Canadian and an Australian walk into a bar...

Well the last few hours of Bruges were Ok. I went to the chocolate museum, and saw the history of it from the Aztecs to modern day chocolate production, including a demonstration of how the Belgians make pralines (filled chocolates). To George's daughter: Yes, the chocolate is a lot better over here!

So I left Bruges, and made my way down to Brussels. It is a pretty busy city, and by time I got there (around 9), there was little I could do except get my room and have a quick look around. In the map guide I had, it discussed a 1930's jazz bar that piqued my interest more than a little+ I wandered around the general area trying to find something that looked a bit old school, and eventually realised that the ultra-modern bar that I kept walking back and forth in front of was actually the place listed in my map! It would seem it has been refitted since the printing of my guide.

I found my way back to the hostel to find that there was a concert happening in the bar area. I went to check it out, only to find the last song in its final throes. Grabbing myself a drink, I started to chat to some of the people around, and it seems that most of them were involved in some kind of development program for underdeveloped countries. They come to this hostel a couple times a month and either present classes or attend them (I couldn't quite work out which), and this was something the hostel organised in conjunction with that. I chatted about this to two Belgian girls, however I have a feeling the seconds' English wasn't great, as she spent a lot of time smiling and nodding with a big smile, but albeit blank look on her face.

Not long after, another band came on and started performing. It was about a 7 or 8 piece band, with plenty of brass which is just my style. They were really good and moved from a great rendition of Herbie Hancock's "Cantaloupe Island" to some mambo and latin stuff, all the way back to old time jazz. It was really good, and Ill have some photos of them up shortly. Halfway through this I started to chat to a guy in an All Blacks shirt, though he was Belgian, not New Zealandish. We talked about Brussels and what was around and Belgian culture in general, and it was all very informative. He marked a whole bunch of places on my map to go check out, we went through a few different Belgian beers. The band finished, and we kept chatting away until early morning, and which point I figured I'd best get some sleep.

The next day I started wandering around Brussels with the Mexican guy from my dorm. He had been living in France for the past couple of years, and had come up to Brussels to open some art exhibition somewhere. We wandered about taking photos of this and that, but the pace was quite slow. Having had to get through the last few cities fairly quickly, I had developed quite a quick touring style, and I dont take many breaks. Antonio was much more content to stroll around and stop frequently. It didnt help that we got sort of lost and ended up walking in the same circle a couple of times.

I was most interested in checking out the comic museum. Belgians take comics -extremely- seriously, and they´re very ingrained into their natural culture. We found one place, but misread the sign, and it ended up being a scouting museum (more of a corridor, it was very small). We left that and went back to the hostel, but on the way found the real comic museum. I stayed to check it out and Antonio left for the hostel and a nap (siesta?).

The comic museum was pretty cool, so many different comic strips but -heaps- of Tintin stuff which I appreciated. I´ve read all the comics and seen the cartoon versions, so it was fun to pay homage to it a bit. He seems to be their biggest comic export, but the Smurfs aren´t far behind. Unfortunately my camera ran out of juice before the end, so I didnt get too many Smurfs pics, sorry!

After the museum I did my first load of washing. However I was overcome with fear when it came to the dryer, and ended up taking most of it back to my room to hang up. There was only myself, Antonio and Matt the Canadian there, so I figured I could get away with using a few more hangers. We then got some restaurant advice from the chick down the front and headed to dowtown Brussels for an authentic Belgian meal. Antonio, being kinda French ordered a bottle of wine, Bordeaux I think, and Matt and I had the Waterzooi . It was a very nice chicken stew in a white creamy sauce, Antonio had Carbonades, which is like a beef stew. Speaking of food, in Bruges before I left I got some more fries, but this time I got Frittes Stoofrees (spelt wrong). It was basically chips covered in meat goulash, it was great stuff.

Anyway after the meal, we walked back through the Belgian rain and chatted with some people back at the hostel. Belgium rains a lot. Every day seems to start cloudy, get sunny and then start raining about 6.

The next day I wanted to finish off Brussels quickly and get off to Luxembourg. I headed on their "metro" which is basically an underground tram, about 15 minutes out of the center of the city. Here there is the "Atomium", which is a massive great building in the shape of an iron atom. This was pretty cool, and the view from the top sphere was impressive. Apparently the lift was extraordinarily fast, getting us up 100 meters or so in 20 seconds. I felt my ears pop pretty quick. All in all though, its not worth a 9 euro entry fee.

After this I discovered "Mini Europe" which is basically a little park full of 1:25 models of all the famous sights in Europe. The whole thing is based around "Look how awesome the EU is", and the whole thing was a little cheesy. I took a lot of photos, but really its not the sort of place you want to check out by yourself. Its more a thing you go to with a bunch of mates to point and laugh at stuff and take dumb photos. The highlight of this park was a cat that was walking around one of the models, giving a very godzilla like performance, stepping on little cars and stuff. Hilarity! I have photos, but haven't found a place to upload them yet. Some cafes are more locked down than others. So I finished going around Mini Europe, probably spending a lot less time than the average visitor. It was cool to see a few of the monuments I had actually visited in mini form.

Making my way back to the hostel, and picking up another wonderful Belgian waffle on the way, I grabbed my bag, found the train station and headed off to Luxembourg. The train ride was nice, as the train went through various parts of the Ardennes which was very lush and green. With all our water problems back home, its been a while since Ive seen such healthy vegetation!