We took a trip to our Low Country neighbor, Belgium, and stayed for two nights in Bruges.

Bruges is a sleepy little tourist town in Belgium, whose heyday was way back in the 16th century, until its harbor silted up. Then it was pretty much a ghost town, a well-preserved medieval city, just waiting to be discovered by 20th and 21st century tourists like us. What we found was a very cute place with narrow cobbled lanes, canals, and of course, the aforementioned beer and chocolate.

We climbed the old Belfry to get a view of the town from 366 steps up. The tower houses the works of the clock and many bells which plays tunes every 15 minutes. Here is what the Belfry looks like from solid ground. The Market Square is where a lot of action in town is, with many cafes lined up with outside tables.

One touristic thing we did not do was to take a horse and buggy ride. They really smelled when they went by, since the horses all wore diapers, and carried their stuff with them as they went.

We bought some very yummy chocolate from two different shops (one we went to twice). Best chocolate ever! We took a tour of a brewery and saw how one local brewer concocted their beer. At a small pub, Robin had the best peach beer she's ever tasted, and Matt enjoyed a delicious Trappist monk brewed Trippel. We tasted a few other Belgian staples as well.

Bruges has several canals running through the heart of the city, making for picturesque scenes. Here's Matt on a bridge spanning one of the canals. Here we are together: us in Bruges.

On the morning we left, we paid a visit to the Groeniger Musuem, the major art musuem of Bruges. We saw many works by Hans Memling, a Flemish Renaissance painter, as well as art by many other Belgian artists, up to the present day. Then it was back on the train to Haarlem.