Stuart Pinfold

Travel review of Bruges, Belgium

A few weekends ago, we drove from Bedfordshire all the way through to Bruges in Belgium (though, obviously, not across the channel!). See this post for information on why we went on this 'dirty weekend'!

The following is an extract from the travel review written afterwards - read the whole thing on my website.

The E40 motorway is a 5-minute drive from the ferry deck, and the Belgian border about 10 minutes' drive from the motorway junction. No fear, though: the border consists only of a sign at the side of the road welcoming you to Belgium - crossing borders the way the should be.

Bruges from there is about a 40-minute drive straight up (and a little bit across) on the motorway. About 25 minutes up, you come to a junction going west to the seaside town of Ostende or east to Bruges, Brussels and - eventually - onto the Kazakhstan-China border.

A good place to stop en route is the PJ chocolate factory in Ostende. On the outskirts of the historic Belgian seaside town, the factory produces and sells chocolate, and also has two rooms at the back for cigarettes and alcohol. Although there was not much production of the silky brown stuff going on while we were there, we did see moulds of chocolate of both breast and penis shapes stacked up on the 'factory floor'. We both got our families loads of Easter presents, a big box of chocolates each for work, plus a few bars for the rest of the journey, for about £30 - about a third of the price you would expect to pay for the amount and quality received.

The best first thing to do in Bruges is just to walk. 'Get lost,' as some guide books put it. Wander around the little cobbled streets, along the beautiful canals, stick your head into some of the Flemish courtyards, and stroll around the daffodil-lined squares.

The Belfry is the odd-looking of the three towers in Bruges. You can pay a nominal amount for the privilege of losing your breath (or keeping fit, however you look at it...) while climbing up the 350-odd spiral steps to three levels of the tower. The first is where the city's treasury was based many years ago, and you can still see the iron gates which kept any thieves out and the cash in. The next level up enables you to see the amazing cogwork of both the giant clock, and the massive barrel which produces the folk-song-by-bells music heard every 15 minutes.

We stayed in the cheapest place we could find - the St Christopher's Inns Bauhaus budget hotel.

Each guest at the Bauhaus is given a Bruges Card free of charge - offering a 5-20% off various city attraction entrance prices. There's also a voucher for three free half-pints (one cherry beer, one Belgian beer and one wheat beer) at the hostel's bar, plus 10% off all drinks and meals at the attached cafe-restaurant-pub.

For lunch the second day, we went to a cafe highly recommended by the guide book called BarChoc. Looking at the menu, we realised that the book had underestimated just how much of a chocolate-lovers' haven this place is. We started off with drinks - hot chocolate of course. For mains, I had lamb stew cooked in Belgian beer on a bed of pasta, and Sarah had the rabbit in beer on a pasta bed. All very well - but the whole thing was cooked in the most delicious dark chocolate, including the pasta.

See more photos in the Bruges trip gallery on my website.

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