Brussels - a Cultural City Break

A warm evening walk through the Grand Place

So as some of you already know earlier this month we went to Brussels on a little short break with Mr A in tow, you can read about our lovely time on the Eurostar, which got us to the centre of Brussels in just over 2 hours. I have been to Brussels before a few times but never for longer than 2-3 hours at a time while I would be waiting for a train/plane connection of some sort so it was lovely to be able to explore the city for four full days and see what it was all about. We were lucky enough to stay in two amazing hotels, first The Dominican and second the Marriott (reviews to follow). We tried a lot of local food and local beer (of course) which I will go into more depth in another post and we used public transport every day, whizzing around on the metro and trams and even buses and didn't just stay in the city centre but also explored other areas of the city.

Of course we made sure that we visited the "must-see" sights such as the Manneken Pis and for those who don't know what that is, it's a statue of a little boy weeing into a fountain as well as the Grand Place, Grote Markt and Cathedral of Saint Michael as well as exploring the outdoors with wonderful walk through the beautiful Parc De Brussels. What we loved most of all was wandering the streets, enjoying the food, local shops and the whole atmosphere of this vibrant and understated city

We visited some great Museums and will be doing a top 3 for kids in our next post, but needles to say there was more than enough to keep children entertained in the city of comics, cartoons and waffles and Mr A really enjoyed all the animated statues scattered around the city

We walked through the famous Royal Galleries which houses all the very expensive shops such as Rolex and Longchamp but also has some beautiful Macaroon and Chocolatiers and couldn't resist picking up a little box of treats.

Throughout our stay we were pleasantly surprised with how much there was to do and see and even though we had heard mixed reviews on food we found some great places to eat. With Brussels being so close to Bruges you could easily spend a long weekend exploring both. Brussels is a mix of being a little bit gritty with some colour thrown on top, it's vibrant and filled with music and street art, although we would recommend exploring more than just the city centre. We had two trips further afield, out of what they call the Petit ring (central district) to the Atomium and to the Natural History Museum.

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