Visiting my bestie in Belgium

Remember the wedding I went to last December?! I finally had time to visit my bestie Maryline in Belgium. When I was there for the wedding she obviously didn‘t have a lot of time and I didn‘t see anything of the country.

I left for Zurich airport in the morning of Friday, August 3 and arrived in Brussels at 3 pm after a little delay. Maryline and her husband Thomas picked me up at the airport. It was like we never left each other, talking about everything and catching up on the things that happened the past few months. We drove to their home in Beveren and spent the evening at their house. Lots of talking, pizza and planning the next few days. Let‘s say, we went to bed late.

The next morning we had a relaxed breakfast, before heading to the train station. Mary and I took the train to Brugges, which took about an hour. From the station we walked into the old town of Brugge, where it was very impressive. The city is like an outdoor museum, so gorgeous! The houses, the architecture, the canals... After walking for a while, we had lunch on the terrace of a cute Italian restaurant. It was a hot day, but they had a breeze there, the food was good, the waiter was very friendly ans we were able to do a lot of people watching. After lunch we walked around a bit more, before doing a boat tour, through the canals. That‘s definitely the best way of getting to know the city and seeing everything without having to walk. We walked through the rest of town, had a homemade icetea and then took the train back to Beveren. In the evening we had a yummy pesto pasta, spent some quality time together and watched Morning Glory and The Age of Adeleine (we saw that together in Berlin three years ago).

On Sunday we had a chilled morning with a long breakfast, mostly due to talking, then we just chatted away for the whole morning until Mary‘s husband got home and we had lunch. In the early afternoon we started watching the first episode of Big Little Lies. We couldn‘t finish the first episode until one of the other bridesmaids arrived, it’s confusing and weird. Together we walked to Kastel Cortewalle, where they opened a pop up bar. That was a special moment for us, because Mary got married there and lots of the wedding photos were taken there. It was a beautiful location back in December, but omg it‘s so gorgeous in summer too. We just talked the whole afternoon and went for dinner nearby. Back at the house it was time for some Harry Potter Trivial Pursuits. Two potterheads having fun 😉 Some questions were not that easy though. Then we continued to watch Big Little Lies, I think in the end it was three episodes and things got a but clearer, still not sure what to think about the show though.

Monday was already my last day in Belgium. We decided to take the train to Antwerp after breakfast. Their main station is stunning, so pretty, parts of it reminded me of Grand Central in New York. We first conquered the shopping street, both of us ended up buying Harry Potter things from Primark, surprise, surprise...
We just walked through the streets and Maryline always pointed out things to me. We had lunch in a very cute square and actually a bit of a fancy restaurant, it was very delicious. After lunch we walked some more and went to the Grote Markt, the popular square in Antwerp. Unfortunately, parts of the buildings were in scaffolding and white tents blocked the view too. Shame for the photos, but oh well. At 3 pm it was time to go back to Beveren, pack my things and then leave for the airport ☹️.
I had to switch trains once to get to the airport and almost missed my connection, I had to run. I got theough security quickly though, did some duty free shopping and looked at some other stores as well. Then I treated myself to a Stella (Belgian beer) and a panini. Then it all started... Two hours before departure they were already saying that there is a delay of 30 minutes, after a while they added another twenty, in the end it turned out to be 1 hour and 20 minutes, yay! By the time I got home it was midnight, even the train in Zurich was delayed, but luckily I still got my bus.

I had the most wonderful weekend with the best person! We finally had time to catch up witb each other properly and just had a great time! Thank you for having me Maryline and for everything else as well, love you.

Belgium, I will be back! Brugge is such a pretty city and Antwerp was lovely as well, can‘t wait to be back.