A Visit Back To Medieval Times

The next stop on our itinerary would be in the medieval town of Bruges, Belgium. It is a historic city in the northwestern part of Belgium. It was a 2.5 hour drive from Haarlem with a short stop in Rotterdam for some business concerns that BD had to handle.
The old part of Brugges is a little difficult to maneuver by car. The streets are very narrow and most of them go only one way. Of course we made a few wrong turns along the way as we tried to find our way into the town and to our hotel.
Once settled, we got out and made a visit to the town square and up we went in the belfry tower.

Lots of steps on the way up but the view was pretty good this day from the top so it was well worth the climb.




As in Amsterdam, we had to take the obligatory canal cruise. No houseboats here though. Just canals.





After that it was back to the town square for a Belgian beer and some pommes frites (french fries).

My beer cost me $12...The fries were about $5
It's no secret that the value of the American dollar is down right now. But this was ridiculous!


The next day we left Bruges and headed back to Holland. Along the way I noted the many canals. It was interesting to see that along most of the canals, they have planted trees along side of them and it makes for a nice look. Looked almost like a postcard!


Our last day in Holland would takes us to visit a couple of castles.

The most notable one was Muiderslot not far from Amsterdam.

As we were leaving the castle I was thinking about how life would have been back in those simpler and tougher times. Must have been difficult. Then I looked up and saw a familiar sight.....a contrail from a westbound airliner. I was quickly jolted back to reality!

The following day we were up early and soon found ourselves at Schiphol airport in Amsterdam boarding a westbound KLM A-330 headed for Texas. Our week in The Netherlands had gone by amazingly fast. Most vacations do.

So now it's back to work again. We'll see if the MD-80 fleet can survive another summer. Thanks again for enduring my vacation stories.



For a look at some more of my photos, please aviate over to Plane & Simple.