Our Opinion
Apart from its charm and period buildings, Bruges is famous for beer and it's available just about everywhere you look. Our favourite had to be the Straffe Hendrick; it's a deceptive beer tasting like the sort of thing you'd like to quaff on a hot Summer's day. We can't recommend doing this though, it has an ABV of 9.0%!
As well as drinking the produce you can also take a guided tour of the brewery. One of our number took this opportunity whist the rest of us considered that a waste of valuable drinking time.
Food in Bruges is also very good. We found a Chinese restaurant not very far from the Cathedral Square in the centre of the town that was both excellent in terms of quality and service and was also very reasonably priced.
On a more sombre note we also took the opportunity to visit Ypres, the site of one of the bloodiest battles of the First World War.
The Menin Gate stands at the end of the main street in the town and is a memorial to the allied soldiers who lost their lives during the battle and whose bodies were never found. In total there are more tan 54,000 names inscribed on the memorial, an horrific reminder of the carnage that must have occurred.
It takes a lot to silence us but after visiting the Menin Gate we didn't speak for quite some time, just sitting, drinking coffee and reflecting on what we had seen.
We visited Ypres just after the Armistice Day ceremonies had taken place and there was ample evidence that people have not forgotten - nor, in our opinion, should they
Further Details
Travel
Blackpool - London with First North Western and Virgin Trains
No problems with our journey on this occasion.
London - Bruges with Eurostar and Belgian Railways
The outward journey was uneventful but on the return journey we were diverted around rural Northern France which made for a pleasant excursion even if it did mean missing our connection home in London.
Bruges - Ypres with Belgian Railways
An pretty uneventful journey taking in a number of rural and industrial areas of Belgium. The mood was lightened at Ypres station on the way home when one of our number managed to lock himself in the toilet with our train back to Bruges fast approaching the platform!
Accommodation
Hotel De Goezeput, Bruges
A small hotel with no two rooms the same. One of our rooms was immense whilst another was tiny. The rooms were clean and tidy however although one of us was troubled by mosquitoes.
The hotel doesn't have a bar but that's not really a problem in Bruges! Breakfast is the only meal we had in the hotel, boiled eggs seemed to be the favourite dish of the day!