road trip belgium

When thinking about the things we wanted to do in Europe this time around, one of our high priorities was making it to Belgium and Luxembourg. Andrew's parents had done a road trip around Belgium a few years ago and it seemed like a great way to see the smaller breweries that freckled the country. So we rented a car in Paris and made our way north to the country that's the only oasis of good beer in the otherwise barren land of Europe.

French countryside on our way to Belgium (from the car window).

Our first stop was in southern Belgium in the town of Bouillon. They beer was called Godfred in honor of Godfrey of Bouillon who was a knight in the first Crusade who became the first ruler of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. We were there on a Sunday and a mountain bike race was going on. The streets were packed with cars and people on mountain bikes. We only stayed in the idyllic valley for a drink, before heading of to our next destination, Rochefort.

City of Bouillon.

Rochefort is the closest city to the Rochefort Abbey, where they brew the Rochefort Trappist beer. A Trappist beer is a beer made at a Trappist monastery, but there are only ten in the world, eight of which are in Belgium. It came in a 6, 8 & 10, with the numbers relating to their alcohol content, and once again the theory was proven: more alcohol, more taste.

Maggie enjoying a Rochefort 10 in Rochefort.

The next day we left Belgium for a quick foray into Luxembourg. The reason we went to Luxembourg was not because of the city. Don't get us wrong, the city was really great. It sat on a plateau above the surrounding land and was known as the most defensible spot in all of northern Europe of a thousand years - it's a very awesome city, almost like a Monaco of the north. But the real reason we went there was so Andrew could meet one of his favorite professional cyclists: Andy Schleck. Andy had to retire from cycling a few years ago because of a knee injury, but since then he had opened up a bike shop in Luxembourg, and the word on the street was that he actually worked at the shop. There had been a fire, and the shop had been closed for six weeks, but it was having its grand reopening on the day we were in Luxembourg.

Andrew meeting Andy Schleck. We actually talked to him for a while and he was the nicest guy. In the background is the bike he won the Tour de France on.

The gorge below the old city of Luxembourg, and also the location of our hotel, so we had a steep hike up to the city.

On our way to the fortified city, with Andrew looking back down at our hotel.

A view from the other side of the old city. It's a peninsula of high ground because of a river the winds around it.

 The next day after our short stay in Luxembourg, it was back to Belgium, and back to the beer. Our first stop was at the Brasserie D'Achouffe. It's a very popular beer in Belgium and has a wonderful brewery hidden in a deep valley. Their mascot is a elf picking hops and the place feels like somewhere elves would make beer.

To D'Achouffe we go.

 From D'Achouffe, we headed to Durbuy, known as the smallest town in the world. It's another old defensible town built in the middle ages, and it hasn't changed much since. It has tight little streets and old stone buildings, as well as it's own brewery (Durbuyose).

The tight streets of Durbuy

Our car on the road in Belgium.

We had heard that Brussels was a fun town and decided to stay there for two nights - and we were very happy we did. We loved Brussels--it felt like a mix of Paris and Berlin. There we old ornate buildings interspersed with modern clean buildings. And the beer... even the smallest of beer stores will have a selection of a hundred beers. The bars are even more amazing. Some bars have fifty beers on tap and a selection of hundreds of bottles - and they are all good. Bars in Belgium have another funny quirk: they will only serve a beer out of its own specific glass from its brewery. So those hundreds of beers a bar has? They each have their own glass. If someone else is drinking that beer, you just have to wait until they're done! Brussels is a beer-lover's paradise, and a city we will for sure be going back to.

Every Belgium beer has a particular glass its beer comes in. Meaning most bars have hundreds of different glasses.

This statue of a little boy peeing (called the Manneken Pis) is the most famous sight in Brussels. For some reason. Here, Andrew is joining the Manneken Pis in relieving himself. There is a whole committee in Brussels that changes his outfit every day.

Maggie enjoying a Belgian waffle with ice cream.

Drinking some great beers in Brussels' amazing city center. The city really is beautiful.

Andrew playing Pokemon in another epic place in Brussels.

On our way out of Brussels, we stopped at the Cantillon brewery. It is one of the two places in the world still make beer with a process called wild fermentation, meaning they just open the windows and let wild yeast blow in to get the beer making process going. It was how all beers were made a few hundred years ago, and now their Lambic is one of the last. It's a bitter beer that is the missing link between wine and beer.

Lambic brewing in barrels in the roof of the brewery.

anniversary in jaffa

Our anniversary is not a day for working, but for celebrating. So we headed out early in the morning and rented two bikes. It was our first experience with the Tel Aviv bike rental system, and it looked similar to the others we'd used (like Velibs in Paris), but as we found out later in the day, not so.
Like many things in Tel Aviv, the bike rental was a little more expensive than in other cities, so we planed on making half an hour hops from place to place, and return the bikes while we hung out. Our first hop was to breakfast closer to the beach on Ben Yehuda St. We ate on the patio of a nice little cafe and had a traditional Israeli breakfast, which involves many little things (which ended up being a food theme for the day, without us even planing it).

Our Anniversary Breakfast

After breakfast, we rented two more bikes and rode to Jaffa. We hadn't gone there yet and even though it's a different city, Tel Aviv and Jaffa are as close as conjoined twins. Jaffa is actually a much older city than Tel Aviv, with a history stretching back three millennia, and is mentioned in both the old and new testaments.

They have a rustic shopping district that we decided to find ourselves an anniversary present in. We had been talking about getting a Mezuzah as a souvenir from Israel and realized there was no better time. So we spent a while perusing the selections and made a decision. From there we made our way to the Jaffa Port to met up with Andrew's friend at his work.

When we got to Jaffa Port, the difference between all other cities' rental bikes and Tel Aviv's rental bikes became apparent to us. There is a special lock you must fully engage to return the bike. Well, one of the first bikes we returned before we went to breakfast must not have been 'fully' engaged, because we received an email telling us that it still hadn't been returned and we've been getting charged since. We didn't have phones, only wifi. We searched Jaffa Port for a wifi connection and finding one, went to the rental bike's website and began a labored process that ended with us finding out that it was a mixup on their side, and we would not be charged.

With that settled, we met up with Andrew's friend and got a tour of the news station he works at.

Jaffa Port

Jaffa's Lighthouse

Bird Buddy

Andrew and his friend at his friend's work in Tel Aviv

After the tour we went back to Jaffa Port for some drinks and dinner. While there, we were consumed by a orange stick wielding mob. It was some new Tae Bo thing were you could do dances and workouts with the orange sticks. There were enthusiastic instructors teaching everyone how to use them--how could we resist?

After some exercise, it was on to dinner at The Old Man and The Sea, a famous Jaffa restaurant. Like breakfast, it was many small things they piled onto your table until there was no room for anything else. And as soon as you finished something, they would take it and fill that gap on the table with something new. It's a place to come to hungry to, because you could eat yourself silly.

Orange Stick Workout

Hanging at the Port

Eating at The Old Man and the Sea

 

Maggie being angelic as always

essaouira is très tranquille

From Marrakesh we headed to the small beach town of Essaouirra. It's on the Atlantic coast of Morocco and famous for being a musical center during the 70s. Artists like Cat Stevens and Jimi Hendrix spent time there as well as Orson Wells, who has a much abused bust in one of the town squares.

It was surprising how much the drive to Essaouirra from Marrakesh looked like New Mexico - minus the goats in trees, which unfortunately, we didn't get pictures of.

There are some goats near a tree in the middle there.

Essaouira is supposedly the best Atlantic port close to the Mediterranean, so it has been fought over for many hundreds of year. As a result, there is a pretty impressive wall full of cannons that goes right up to the ocean's edge. Since this isn't the US, you can climb all over it and take some great pictures.

 We ended up spending quite a lot of time in Essaouira, a month or so. As a result we got to do a lot of exploring, and lucky for us, Essaouira actually had quite a lot to offer for a small town. We stayed in the old Medina inside the city walls, but right outside there was a very active port and next to that, there was an amazing beach that stretched for miles along the natural bay that gives the town its famous reputation. In the bay there is a little island that is now a national park, so you can't go to it. But on the island there are Phoenician ruins that are visible from the beach, and supposedly gave Jimi Hendrix the inspiration for his song, Castles Made of Sand. But since Jimi first visited Essaouira a few years after writing the song, we knew it was just tourist hype.

Part of the wall the circles the whole Medina.

The Medina's main drag.

The other direction of the Medina's main drag.

The major square in the Medina where a lot of restaurants are located.

One of the many tight streets the weave their way through the Medina.

The view from our hotel room.

They like to try and sell you art in Essaouira. The cat wasn't for sale.

A view back towards the Medina from the Port.

Essaouira's beautiful beach.

Camel rides, anyone?

A nice dinner on the beach boardwalk.

Dinner with a little entertainment.

The rocks just outside the walls the surround the Medina.

Phoenician ruins out in the water. Castle made of sand?

At first we weren't too enchanted with Moroccan cuisine, but Essaouira had some great food. Olives for days and some really good Charmwa made our time eating in Morocco quite enjoyable. We also ate a lot of pizza, which was everywhere in Essaouira for some reason, and they did pretty well (our favorite was the veggie pizza with potatoes and rice, since they consider rice a vegetable here).

Lots of olives in every color of the rainbow.

Nothing better than a Charmwa with fries.