Robot Monkey Pants

What a difference a full night of sleep makes. Our bed is wonderful, and we both woke up around 8 on our own. So we took our turns in the shower (it’s a shared bathroom a half floor down), and hit the breakfast downstairs. Wow, that was a spread. The English Breakfast is a bit… huge. I think tomorrow I’ll have him omit a few entries.

By 10:30, we were out of the hotel, but not quite out on the town. First order of business was dropping off our laundry. We found a place after a bit of looking, and by 11 or so, we were finally under way, mindful that we had until 7 to pick up our clothes. Unsure on what we wanted to do first, we chose the Tower of London, so we hopped the tube and made our way to the tower. Heed my advice, buy your tickets in the Trader’s Gate next to the tube stop, or in the Welcome center just west of the long, long ticket lines. In the Welcome center, you have to pay by credit card, but at £17 a ticket, you’re probably going to want to charge it anyway.

We walked into the main gate around noon, just as a guided tour with the Yoeman Warder (more popularly known as the Beefeater) guided tour of the tower. This was great — our Yoeman Warder was fantastic, entertaining, and informative. The hour flew by. I highly recommend visiting the Tower, if only for the tour.

After the tour, we visited the White Tower for an exhibit on Henry VIII’s armor throughout the years. It was quite interesting (and quite full of stairs). After three floors of armor, and one floor of gift shop (that’s how they getcha), we wandered outside in time to see a guard change at the Crown Jewel house. The line for the jewels was tremendously long, and we knew it was twice as long inside, but it seemed a shame to not go in, so we got in line. Well, while the line may be long, it moves steadily, and before we knew it we were inside, moving through the serpentine queues watching videos and eventually making it to the moving sidewalk that gently glides you past the jewels. They’re pretty impressive, for a bunch of shiny metal and glittery rocks.

After a quick lunch at the cafe, we made our way out of the tower and onto one of the Thames river cruises, this one taking us from the tower back to the Westminster pier, in front of Parliament and Big Ben right around 5. We stopped off at a pub across the street from the Parliament building (St. Stephen’s Tavern, full of businessfolk just getting off from their workday) before ultimately catching a bus that took us to within a few blocks of the laundry.

We got there just in time, and lugged the clothes back to the hotel by way of a dingy pub with mediocre beer that simply isn’t worth mentioning, and a cute little park that took up half a city block. After a brief period of panting on the bed (no, not what you think, it was from lugging all out clothes up all those stairs, we headed back out and just down the road to the Ebury Wine Bar and Restaurant for supper. Pricey, fancy, schmancy. Good meal, though — the wine was quite nice.

Tomorrow, we’ve got another full day. We plan to visit the British Library, we have a BBC tour at 3, and hope to spend the evening at the Parliament building. Also, we’ll mail out postcards that have no chance of arriving before we get home, but it’s what we do.

Will post pics another night, I’m just beat and it’s after midnight now.

Cheers!

Our first day in London was fuller than expected. The ferry arrived at 6:30 local time (wake-up call came an hour prior), so we had a pretty early start to the day. We cleared passport control, made our way to the adjacent train station, and rode the train into the city. It was an uneventful ride, though you can tell that England’s rail system isn’t as nice and smooth as in the rest of western Europe. I was more reminded of the train rides in Chicago, with rocking and rolling noisy tracks, instead of the smooth and quiet glide.

After transferring to the Tube (and getting on the Circle Line in the wrong direction, making our ride a bit longer, but we ultimately made it to the Victoria Street Station. From there, it’s about a 10 minute walk to our hotel.

I’d like to take a moment to voice my disapproval of this European concept of the ground floor being “G” or “0″, and not “1″, because while a second story walkup sounds tolerable, when it’s really a third floor room with loooong stair climbs (the ceilings here are quite high), it takes its toll. My thighs are burning, especially on the trips where we’re lugging things. Still, I suppose it’s good for me. Everyone needs to go into cardiac arrest once or twice a day to feel alive.

Since we arrived before noon, we ended up just dropping the bags and heading back out. First stop, Fleet Street and Ye Olde Cheshire Cheese, a quaint old pub that was a favorite haunt of Charles Dickens. I enjoyed a pint of Samuel Smith’s Old Brewery Bitter (from cask, of course), followed by a Samuel Smith’s Old Brewery Extra Stout. Nice stuff, on both counts, and the atmosphere was great.

We then walked from there to the Millennium Bridge (a pedestrian bridge across the Thames), past the Tate Modern and the Globe Theatre, ending up at the Borough Market, which we thought would be still going, but it was dead. I guess our innkeeper had some bad info. (Though, he’s great, and super friendly.)

Since we were in the area, we stopped for lunch at the Brewer’s Wharf, since it appeared they did their own beers. Alas, no, they didn’t have any on tap at the moment, so I instead tried a Meantime Maibock. All in all, it was a hip, trendy, overpriced bar. Meh. Beer was good, though.

After lunch, we hit Vinopolis, a wine museum that teaches you how to taste wine, and includes 5 tastings. Interesting, overpriced, and not quite as great as I was hoping.

(Overpriced is going to be a theme here. This is London.)

We also got the upgrade for the whiskey tastings. Don’t bother. They had three whiskeys, and one of them was a blend. Dalwhinnie 15, Talisker 10, and Johnny Walker Black. The Dalwhinnie was great (I have it at home), the Talisker was quite peaty (I expect Tisha will want us to get some of that), and the Johnnie Walker was, in my opinion, absent any character whatsoever. I don’t go for blends.

We caught a series of tube trains back to this part of town, fighting station closures and line disruptions, and went back to the room to recover. After an hour or so, we hit a mall attached to the train station ti get some supplies. Alas, contrary to the mall’s website which indicated stores were open until 8, they’d all closed at 5, so we just ate some supper and made our way back to crash for the night.

Busy, full day, pics will come later. We are exhausted.

An abbreviated report today for an abbreviated day. The rave last night ended at midnight, but the commotion went on until well past 3. There’s a downside to having such a great view.

It was a weird experience, watching the square go from its normal self (with people sitting in the cafés around the perimeter, and a handful of people walking through the center), to a throbbing mob dancing to dance music with flashing lights and smoke, to near empty again in the middle of the night, to what we woke up to this morning — a huge market!

The whole square was filled with booths, people selling everything. Cheese, meats, fish, snacks, clothes, toiletries and other drugstore products… you name it.

We checked out of the hotel, made our way to the train station to drop off our bags and buy our train tickets to Hoek Van Holland for our ferry ride to the UK. Then we walked back into town for some breakfast/lunch and to explore the market.

We also visit the Teyler’s Museum, the oldest museum in Holland. It’s also quite an eclectic collection — everything from fossils to early electric experiments, to telescopes, to rare books and old paintings. It’s unique, and certainly worth a visit.

After the museum and market visit, and a little stop for an afternoon beer, we made our way to the train station, and finally to Hoek van Holland. Our ferry starts checking in in an hour, and we’ll spend tonight on the boat. Tomorrow, we’ll arrive in Harwich, England, and take a train from there to London for our week in that fine city. Should be fun!

No pics today.

A full day in Haarlem began with our breakfast at our hotel, the Hotel Amadeus. We had known for the past few days that the weather was going to be rainy today, but we’ve dealt with our share of rain. So, after breakfast, we loaded up the umbrellas and made our way to our first stop, Grote Keurk.

This huge, old, church sits right on the square. The unique features inside include some impressive stained glass windows, some model ships, a cannonball embedded in a wall, a floor made of headstones, and a pipe organ that rises to over 30 feet tall. This beast has eight octaves, and was once played by people such as Mozart, Handel, and (for some reason) Albert Schweitser.

After the church tour, we wandered the streets of Haarlem some more, making our way south to the Frans Hals museum. The museum is nice, dominated by the work of Frans Hals, natch. It’s a lot of portraiture, but with the guidebook at my side to show me what to look for, I found it pretty enjoyable. There’s also a very impressive dollhouse exhibit.

Following the museum tour, we made our way to a streetside cafe to have some lunch, settling on a nice sandwich place. Great food, reasonably priced, friendly service. Tisha’s sandwich was an awesome concoction featuring ciabatta bread, goat cheese, honey, and walnuts. It really worked well!

We eventually returned to the hotel to figure out our evening, then went out again walking all over town, enjoying frites, sampling beer, walking through the red light district (yes, Haarlem has one, too), and eventually heading to dinner at an Indonesian restaurant. That was also a feast fit for a king. I’d had high hopes I might lose some weight this trip with all the walking, but man, the food…

Anyway, following dinner, we made our way back to our hotel to find a street party/rave going on that’s supposedly going to last until midnight. Remember, our hotel room looks right out onto the square. No early sleep for us tonight.

Tomorrow, we explore Haarlem a little more in the morning, then make our way south to Hoek van Holland to catch an overnight ferry to Britain. Yay!

Pics here.

Our last morning in Brussels went smoothly. We got up, checked out of the hotel, left our bags there, and took a last walk around the area. We stopped by Galeries Royales Saint-Hubert, then had some breakfast, and walked to the Bier Temple to find some rare Belgians to ship home. And we did! The selection in there was just too much — I could have spent a fortune. Instead, I grabbed two bottles each of Westvleteren 8 and 12, and we made our way to the post office.

Now about 4 kilos of chocolate and 4 beer are making their way to the States. Hurrah! We then caught the subway to the train station, and had a relaxing 2.5 hours (with a couple of train changes) for the ride to Haarlem.

What a delightful little town. Our hotel is right on the Grote Markt, a short half mile walk from the train station. Our room overlooks the square — what a great view!

We took it easy the rest of the day, sipping a beer, taking in the Netherlands charms, having dinner in a cafe on the square, and retiring to the room on the early side.

Tomorrow is looking like rain, but we’ll make the most of our one full day in this cool little town.

Pics here.

Our second full day in Brussels was a very rainy one. Up to this point, we’ve generally watched the rain happen from inside, our impeccable timing keeping us dry. Not today.

A quick bite for breakfast across from our hotel, and off to the Musical Instrument Museum! This place was fantastic, really. They start by giving you headphones — nice little Sennheiser infrared headphones, and tell you that if you stand on a little numbered sticker on the floor, you’ll hear the instruments you’re looking at. And it generally worked like a charm! You start by looking at folk instruments through the ages, then move on to western classical instruments, and then a floor devoted to strings and keyboards. Really fascinating, all very wonderful sounding. Then up to the 6th floor to the cafe for a great view of the city. If you want, you can head down to the basement to see an interactive display of instruments, plus some weird all-in-one monstrosities that are a cross between a jukebox, a player piano, and a one man band.

That visit took us four hours, with us leaving right at closing time. We hopped a bus to Grand Place/Grote Markt to take in the scenery, but we got caught in a downpour just as we arrived. Luckily, our handy dandy super-collapsible travel umbrellas saved the day, and after a brief stop in a parking garage waiting for the torrent to pass, we were back underway. We stopped in a little bar on the square to have a beer and plan the rest of the day. After the beer, we grabbed a waffle (since we hadn’t done that yet), and did some chocolate shopping.

I bought a lot of chocolate souvenirs that I’m going to ship home if I want to not check baggage (and lug pounds and pounds of yummy belgian chocolate with me over the next few days). Tomorrow, before we leave town, I’m going to do some beer shopping as well and try to ship everything home at once.

After our chocolate shopping, we headed back to the hotel, dropped off our things, then had dinner at a nice little Italian take-out/cafe just up the road. Tomorrow, we check out, do the aforementioned beer shopping, visit the post office, then hop a train to Haarlem in the Netherlands for two nights before it’s off for a week in London.

Yay! Pics from today are here.

Our first full day in Brussels! The guide warned us, and I can attest, Brussels is a decidedly more seedy city than Brugge. Very big city, grimy, full of people from all over, including folks who want to con you from your money or go through your pockets. But the well prepared traveler is not fazed by this, and I am that.

We slept late, since I’m still having trouble adjusting to the time zone. I fall asleep around 10 or 11, but by 3 AM I’m wide awake, and it takes another couple of hours for me to fall back to sleep. Still, it’s nice to sleep in, and we had a relatively relaxed schedule on this day anyway.

First order of business was breakfast (or, by the time we were out and about, brunch). We opted for convenience and went with the cafe in the hotel. Ouch, was it overpriced! But no matter, we made our way southeast to the Royal Museum of Fine Arts. Opting to see the permanent collection of ancient and modern art, we didn’t realize what a full day it was to become. The ancient collection took us over two hours, and the last bit of it we rushed through so we could see the modern collection before the museum closed. Still, they’ve got a fine collection here.

I’ve never really been a fan of ancient (pre-19th century) paintings. So much portraiture, so many people with china-doll complexions wearing ruffled collars and looking dead, or having oddly large heads for their bodies. I’ve certainly grown an appreciation of fine arts in my lifetime, but just not that. When it comes to the fine arts, I like my music ancient, and my paintings modern or contemporary. Though there were some *wonderful* statues in the ancient collection that simply amazed me. A life-sized discus thrower, who you felt at any minute would stand up and say “Ha! Fooled you!” Such fine details in the arms, hands, muscles… Just amazing. And I could get so close! Close enough to touch it, though you’re not allowed to, so I was a good boy.

The modern collection had some great stuff I was thoroughly enjoying. Once we hit the 20th century collection, I was in my groove, appreciating the pieces without knowing what they were, since my French or Dutch aren’t near good enough to decipher the cards.

They just opened a Magritte wing, though we didn’t get those on our tickets. Just as well, it was quite near closing time by the time we finished. I did, however, discover that Pac Man was invented in 1947. See my Flickr feed for details.

After the museum, we were going to visit the Musical Instrument museum, but it was just about to close, so we put that on the list for tomorrow. Instead, we hopped a bus back to our section of town, had a quick snack (and a beer, natch), then adjourned to the room to plan the evening.

We settled on visiting a recommended bar, A La Mort Subite, a few blocks from the hotel. A wonderful beer selection, including many fine lambics (especially geuzes) are featured. I stuck to the abbey ales, while Tisha sated her sour tongue on the Mort Subite (of course). After a couple of brews, we made the hike to La Bier Circus, a quaint little dinner spot with a fantastic beer selection. Hey, remember, we came to Belgium for the beer!

I had a wonderful Flemish Red (slightly sour, well balanced) named Ichtegem’s Grand Cru, a delightful Tripel named Adelardus, and I finished off the evening with a 2004 Chimay Grande Reserve. You could still see the dust on the bottle. And… wow. Just wow. So fantastic, so complex.

I need to buy a bunch of this and cellar it for 5 years — it’s totally worth it.

Tomorrow, it’s the Musical Instruments museum, the Cantillon brewery, and shopping for beer and chocolate! Yum!

Pics here.

Today was partly a travel day.  We started with a breakfast at the “boathotel”, then made our way to Brugge station to catch our train to Brussels.  One our later, we arrived at Brussels Centraal, then a short hop on the metro to our hotel, an awesome fancy schmancy affair that offers rooms at a bargain during the summer when no business travelers are here.

Our hotel is quite close to the sights, so after some cooling off in the room, we made our way out into the city, walking around this old town and seeing what it had to offer.  By the route we took, what it had to offer was restaurants.  Dozens upon dozens of them.  After a stop at one of the cheapish ones (and, really, nothing is cheap in Belgium) for lunch, we wandered some more, eventually finding a grocery store for some necessities, then winding our way back through the mass of restaurants to the Delerium Cafe.

So, here’s the thing about the Delierum Cafe… it’s kind of a beer mecca.  Delerium Tremens is one of the most popular strong belgian beers (though I’m more of a Delerium Nocturnum man, myself).  This bar has that, and 2003 other beers.  It holds the Guinness Record for most beers available.  Downstairs is where the orgy of beer is – all of those 2004 beers are in the bottle selection there.  Upstairs is the more modest, yet totally mesmerizing, tap selection.  So many good beers, with all the kegs visible behind the bar, and the taps dangling temptingly in front of you.  The menu is like a wish list.  Tonight, I had a Buffalo Bitter (yummy, nice bitterness profile), a Joup (yummy and sweet), Gouden Carolus Christmas Ale, an Orval bottle (aged one year), and a Bersalis.  That, and Tisha’s 2 beer and one water  for €22.60.  A bargain!

We also met Pat, a grad student spending the summer in Europe doing research for his Ph.D., and enjoying the fine beers of Belgium while he’s at it, since the archives are closed on Mondays.  A wonderful, many hours-long chat ensued, and before we knew it, it was after 8 and time to get some supper.

Tonight, we opted for some fast food for supper, since we weren’t up for a big two hour meal.  Also, even with fast food, you can get a fine Belgian beer in the proper glassware!

I love this country.  Tomorrow, museums and the Grand Place!

‘Night!

A decidedly more relaxed pace was decided upon today, since yesterday we were simply exhausted, and even 8 hours of sleep didn’t rejuvenate.  So, after a nice breakfast at the hotel, we made our way into town at a leisurely pace.  We had a false start as I realized I left my camera and credit cards back in the room, so we walked back to the hotel and started the day again.  First up, we made our way to the Groeninge Museum, which is ostensibly the museum in town to see.  For the period we’re in town the permanent collection (which consists mainly of Flemish primitives) was not on display — instead we were treated to a special installation of Karel de Stoute (Charles the Bold), who reigned over the region in the 15th century.  following that, we had a nice lunch in a central square, then made our way to the Church of Our Lady for the second part of the exhibit, and some fine church art and tombs to boot.  Also featuring Michaelangelo’s Madonna and Child, and the tombs of Charles the Bold and his daughter, Mary of Burgundy (the Duchesse of Borgnone for you beer fans).

Speaking of beer, it was off to the Brouwerij De Halve Maan for a pint of their Tripel (Straffe Hendrick) — wonderful!  After resting our bones, we made the trek back up north to spend the evening relaxing at a place that would serve us good food and beer.  And we found it in the Bierbrasserie Cambrinus, with over 400 beers available.  While watching the Men’s Wimbledon Final play out live (holy cow, 30 games in the final set!) we sipped on a variety of incredibly delightful brews, including the much-sought-after Westvleteren trappist beers.  I had an 8 (their dubbel), followed by a 12 (their quadrupel).

Both were delightful, each with its own complexities to decipher.  I may be committing heresy here, but I can say in all honesty they’re not the best beers I’ve ever had.  I know, I know, some will say I’m losing beer credibility by saying this, and I can accept that.  But let me be clear.  I’m not saying they’re not good.  They are.  And their rarity alone makes it worthwhile to try them if you ever get the opportunity.  But, in each case, I’ve found something else in the style I like better.

The Westvleteren 8 pours a dark brown, with a rich head that reduces down to a few millimeters after a few minutes.  But the head stays with the beer the whole way down the glass.  It’s very impressive!  The aroma is delightfully complex, bringing all of it’s character to the nose.  I found the flavor profile nicely masked the alcohol, so it didn’t feel like you were drinking an 8% beer.  A nice bitter finish on this one.

The 12 poured even darker, and its nose gave no hints what lay beneath.  Sweetness rode the front of the liquid, followed by caramel and roasted malts.  No real bitterness to my tongue, but the variety of flavors again masked the alcohol — this one at just over 10%.  It reminded me of a stronger version of Dogfish Head’s Raison D’être. Totally worth the €6.75 for the bottle, and please try it if you get the opportunity.

But, I’ll admit it, having had Ommegang’s Three Philosopher’s, I’m not sure I’ve ever tasted a better quadrupel.  And Maredsous’s much easter to find Dubbel is, IMHO, as fine a dubbel as Westvleteren.  Not as uinque, I’ll grant you.

I guess if you get the opportunity to try the Westvletern, take it, savor it, enjoy it, and remember that you’re tasting what few get to.  But if it’s not the best beer in the world, don’t beat yourself up over it — you’re not alone.

A short walk later, and we retire to the hotel at around 9ish.  Tomorrow, we check out, and make our way to Brussels!

Pics here.

Air conditioning is not prevalent here.  Though once the sun drops, it gets quite pleasant out, so we kept our window open.  Mind you, the sun drops rather late — as I write this it’s 10:40 in the evening, and it’s twilight outside.  The sun is still shining brightly at 9:00 PM.  It’s weird, but I love it.

Anyway, the downside to leaving the windows open at night is that they’re open in the morning.  When you have an east facing room, this is important.  At 8AM, I awoke to the sun beating on my face.  There are worse things you can have beating on your face when you wake up, so I counted myself lucky and began the day.

After a nice breakfast in the restaurant downstairs, we hiked our way north into the city.  Brugge is a beautiful place — very old city with narrow cobblestone streets.  In many ways, it reminded me of Vieux Québec, which is certainly backwards, but there’s where I first visited.  We walked north through the city until we reached Markt Square.  From there, we engaged in a mini city walk — I say ‘mini’ since it was abbreviated by what seemed like a large number of weddings going on at the church in Burg Square, and a lack of interest in the paintings in the museums here.  Still, it was a beautiful walk, and the scenery is simply delightful.

Upon reaching the canal, we took a 30 minute canal tour on a boat.  It was a nice way to both see the city from an angle one does not easily get, and to beat the heat since the breeze from the boat on the water was simply fantastic.  After the boat tour, we made our way through various streets and alleys to the south end of the city , whereupon we decided we were ready for lunch.

Remember this — when having a meal in Europe, plan at least two hours.  It’s a nice relaxed pace here, but it can seem slow if you’re not expecting it.  By the time our lunch was done, it was 3:00, and we took the tour at Half Moon Brewery, the only local brewery in  Brugge.  They produce three beers — a golden ale (6%), a dubbel that’s darker (7.5%) and a tripel at 9%.  I tried both the golden and the dubbel, will try the tripel tomorrow.

The tour was neat — we got to see the ‘historic’ brewery, no longer operational and everything beyond primary fermentation now happens offsite.  Still, we got to climb lots of stairs, see the view from the roof of the brewery, and taste some grains.

After the tour, we decided to make our way to Beertje, a pub that has been universally recommended — they have over 300 beers.  At least, that’s what I read.  I cannot confirm any of this, since we learned upon arrival at the pub that they are closed from late June to July 8 so the employees can go on holiday.  It seems an odd time to close, since I imagine it’s a top tourist destination, and we are most definitely in tourist season here.

So, alas, no Beertje for me.  But since we’d already made our way to the north of the city again, we looked for another beer destination.  Next on my list of good beer pubs is De Garre, which was not too far, so we made our way there.  Finding the first floor full, we made our way upstairs, found a table, and in minutes were enjoying the house tripel.  We were also fortunate enough to make the acquaintance of a lovely couple from Athens, GA at the adjacent table who were on the tail end of their European adventure, and celebrating their engagement (congrats Dustin & Kristin!)  Dustin’s a beer guy, who works for Terrapin Brewery in Athens, a place whose beer I hope to sample some day soon.

We whiled away the hours talking about everything beer and Europe, and before I knew it, it was 7:30, I’d had many, many, fine beers, and we were thinking of supper.  So, we wandered east to a wonderful Pasta Restaurant (Pili Pili), where we enjoyed fine pasta, more beer, and some great desserts.

Eventually, realizing it was 10:00, we decided to make the long walk back south to our hotel.  And now, here I sit, watching the sky slowly dim as it approaches 11PM.  Off to sleep, and another Belgian adventure tomorrow!

Pictures here.