Bruges

http://www.brugge.be/internet/en/index.htm

http://www.brugesinfo.com/

Bruges is a marvelous city, although filled with tourists. It is a nice city for strolling and everything seems to be picture worthy. It is small, walkable, scenic, and you get to check out a vial of the Sacred Blood of Christ! Got to love those Catholic relics.

If time is a constraint you can see Bruges easily in a day. It is a great town and you could stay there for much longer but if you are short on time you could cut a day or two from there. Also as cheesy and horribly touristy as it is do the boat tour in the canals.
Even though I was completely by myself it
was romantic and you get so many little
facts about the town it is worth it.

Be sure to travel via Antwerp rather than
via Brussels to avoid Thalys train fares.

Places to Stay

Bauhaus
Hotel Lucca
Snuffels Sleep
Holiday Flat: Huyze "De Blockfluyt"
B&B Lut and Bruno Setola

Things to Do

You don't really need to do a tour to see the
chocolates, lace & windmills in Bruges,
because they are EVERYWHERE!! Get a
tourist map from the tourism office at the
train station; it lists all the windmills (which
are on the strip of park that surround the
old city, near the Bauhaus hostel).

The early morning markets in the square are really cool. Bruges is just a wonderful place to wander around and explore.

If you're going to buy lace (or anything else for that matter), go about 4 or 5 blocks away from the centre, and the prices drop
dramatically.

We rented bikes one afternoon, even though we
hadn't been on one in years, and had a blast. Saw
a lot of the city, and a lot of interesting streets we
wouldn't have found walking. There is also a very
nice children's store that sells Nientje t-shirts.
Dutch version of Hello Kitty, how cute is that?

The most enjoyable thing we did was to sit in
The Markt and people watch. There are so many
people that come through the square all day, plus all
those beautiful buildings that have been preserved. It's a really buzzing place to be and soak up the atmosphere, even on a cloudy day

Michelangelo’s Madonna and Child is located at the Church of Our Lady in the North Apse. It is free to see, but there is a
fee to tour the rest of the church. It was
the only work of Michelangelo's to leave
Italy in his lifetime.

The church closes at 5pm. Be sure to stroll
through the courtyard at the back of the
church!

The Straffe Hendrik Brewery tour is fun, and
gives a rooftop view of the city with a beer afterward. The tour lasts about 45 minutes and is in English.

Lonely Planet Screwed Me Over Story: There is only one working brewery in Bruges which is the Staffe Hendrik. The
De Halve Maan is no longer open to the public.
I spent a good half hour walking up and down
that road wondering where the entrance was.

Turns out it was all boarded up. Grrr.

The views from the Straffe Hendrik are
arguably better than those from at the
top of the Belfort in the Markt and you
don't have to walk up 366 steps for the privilege!

It's free to enter the Belfort and you only have to pay to walk up all those steps and see the bells. They are working bells and it's pretty loud up there when they start ringing. I was more amused because the bells scared the small children than the mechanics of it, but that's just me.

If you don't fancy the trek, the courtyard is really pretty. Whilst we were there, they were having an art exhibition which was free and fun.

The Groeninge Museum is one of my favourite art galleries in the world. Their audio tour is fantastic and gives some great information about some of the paintings. The building itself is really pretty and has a really nice garden too which is free to wander round.
They have a free cloakroom where you can lose your bags for a few hours.
Sheeps top tip: if you only do one museum, make it this one

Lonely Planet Screwed Me Over Story: I really wanted to see the Museum Voor Volkskunde so badly that I went there 3 consecutive days at different times in the hope that it was open. The life of the peasants
sounded like fun! So I waited and waited and waited some
more for them to open. I must have spent 4 hours there in
total waiting for it to open. I was on the wrong street! The
front door with the sign over it at Rolweg 40 is only for show
the entrance is round the other side of the building. I only found this out as we were leaving Bruges. I did meet a nice cat there though.

Organized Tours

Canals

The canal cruise was beautiful. Yes, totally touristy, but wonderful views.

We had to go on a tour of Bruges when I was
in school, but all I remember is that there are
rats in the canals, so don't stick your hands in.
The guide had such a strong accent we only
understood the third or fourth time he said it,
so it's quite possible I didn't understand
anything else he said, or maybe I just wasn't
interested. A bit of both, probably.

Walking Tours - http://www.quasimodo.be/

I really enjoyed the Quasimodo tour of WWI historical sights.

I did the Quasimodo in Bruges. It was a lot of fun. We stopped at a tavern for a beer even. You get to see parts of the city you may not make the effort to walk to.

I didn't do the long tour to the border, but have heard it really beautiful, but long

Quasimodo tour of Flanders Field was a very interesting daytrip, but kind of expensive.

The other one sounds really touristy (chocolate, windmills, and maybe lace? Can't remember).

Cycling

I've heard good things about the bus trips from Quasimodo.com, but they're expensive. The bike ride to the Dutch border sounds cool.

You can also rent a bike in Bruges and take a short trip to Damme (4-miles from Bruges). Any bike rental location will have a map for that and other trips.

Bruges by Night Quasimodo tour needs 10 people. We emailed them in advance to let them know we were coming, but they can't confirm until the night you get there. Just turn up and hope for the best.

Where to Eat

Make sure to have the waffles in Bruges; they are divine and of course the chocolate and so are the stroopwafels in Amsterdam -- they come packaged like cookies, and I think you can find them in Belgium, too. I have to find a way to make them at home!! I really liked the cherry beer in Bruges.

In Bruges, some of the best food is the street cart frites and the waffles. Not the light fluffy ones- the heavy dense sugary ones. Yummmmmmmmm

The best frite stand in Bruges is located under the bell tower on the Markt (Market Square).

Dumon Chocolatier on Eiermarkt just off of Markt is wonderful! Be sure to visit 'T Bruges Beertje (Kemelstraat 5) and De Garre (on Breidelstraat between Markt and Burg Square, on Garre Alley) for fantastic Belgian beer!

My favourite restaurant meal was the night we had fondue.

Mmmm Belgium chocolates (I liked the ones at the Chocolate Line). Try the mussels at De Bienardier right on the Markt. It's the smallest restaurant, the one that doesn't have waiters outside trying drag you in.

The pizzas at the Bauhaus are cheap and yummy and you don't need to be staying there to eat. Charlie Rockets Hostel do Mexican food that looked cheap too.

We also ate at a place along one of the back streets that only had a menu in Dutch - fortunately we had a translator :-). The witloof met ham en kaassaus in de oven
(chicory gratin) was fantasitc and they gave us extra bread to dip in for free and gave us a little mat to play cards on afterwards. I went back the day after to find out the name, but I couldn't find it again :-(

Day Trips

I really liked Bruges, I spent two nights there and really dug it and felt that one or two more days would have been nice to do one of the many local daytrips in the area.

If you've got time for daytrips from Bruges, I would suggest going to Leper & around for history (Leper has the impressive WWI museum In Flanders Fields and a picturesque town square, and there are many WWI graveyards and other memorials in the area), and to the seaside town of De Haan for leisure (you can reach it by tram from either Oostende or Blankenberge; you can get to a quiet beach by just walking a bit away from the town, or getting of the tram somewhere between Oostende and De Haan, e.g. at Vosseslag; the village itself is much less spoilt by high rise hotels and the like than most other seaside resorts, and relatively quiet once you get away from the main streets year round; you can also go for a walk in the forest, all the way to Blankenberge if you want).

Depending on how long you stay in Bruges you could even combine it with a stop at the Delta works. You probably wouldn't have time to the museum there but it's quite an impressive bit of construction anyway.

Bruges can be done as a daytrip from Gent, or vice versa, I think it's about 40 mins by train.   Anyway if you consider Haarlem, Delft and Bruges as daytrips, it would be: Schiphol - Amsterdam - Antwerp - Gent - Antwerp - Schiphol

I also recommend a stop in De Haan near Bruges. Lovely seaside town.

It's about 3-4 hours Bruges to Amsterdam. Mappy.com shows Bruges being two hours, 48 minutes away from Amsterdam, doesn't sound bad at all, assuming traffic is okay.

We went the "scenic" route from Bruges to Amsterdam through Zeeland. It was pretty, but kind of all of the same.

It would be about a 9-hour train ride to go from Bruges to Paris via Luxembourg.