DE HAAN, AMSTERDAM, HOME (DAYS 40-44)

The scent of manure from the neighboring farm fields was so thick you could taste it as we pulled in to the CenterParcs resort village in De Haan, Belgium on Friday night. Fortunately, the olfactory malefaction passed by midday Saturday and was quickly forgotten as we enjoyed five relaxing days with little planned but exploring the resort and nearby beach on the North Sea, visiting Amsterdam for a day and meeting up with friends one last time.

Our roomy, three-bedroom cabin had a kitchen, two-stories and plenty of room to spread out; a welcome layout for the last accommodations we would call home on our trip. The park had a general store (with a great beer selection) and was packed with activities including an indoor kids' play area, a swim park with a wave pool and waterslides, an indoor sport park where we played a family round of badminton, a bowling alley (didn't), mini-golf (did) and more. Needless to say, along with Disneyland (Day 38) and our afternoon at Stardust park in Brussels (Day 31), DeHaan ranked as one of the kids' favorite destinations.

The town is quiet, picturesque and very European; there are flowers in every window box on the police station and signs exclusively in Dutch in the laundromats. We were pleased to once again find ourselves at a charming refuge favored by locals, even if English is an afterthought in De Haan. The only way I found out that one business was a small grocery/convenience store was by walking up and opening the door. Because their sign wasn't a helpful indicator:

After a breakfast buffet and our first visit to the water slides on Saturday morning, our friends Frank and Carlos made the drive up from Brussels with Frank's mom to explore the area with us.

While we endured some heavy winds and really the first plan-altering precipitation of our entire trip, we still rode a tram to the center of town and the kids hit a trampoline carnival ride before the rains drove us back to the resort. Fortunately our first order of business had been a stroll to the seashore to feel the waves, collect some shells and poke a dead jellyfish with a stick.

After a quiet day around the resort on Sunday, we made our last major sightseeing trip on Monday - Betsy's birthday! - when we got up early to make the three-hour drive to Amsterdam. The Netherlands struck us as being very clean, well-organized and healthy - at least the rest stops, vehicles and roadside fields, buildings and waterways we saw. We arrived in the city shortly before lunchtime and, after hunting down a parking spot, set out on foot to wander along the canals and see what we could find.

Amsterdam, the fourth world capital of our trip, was busy and alive on the crisp, sunny day of our visit. People were milling about everywhere, causing Betsy to wonder, "Don't any of these people have jobs?!"

She left me to ponder that at one of the local coffeehouses while she and the kids took a little walk. It was some of the best coffee I've ever had (not pictured).

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The most watery city in the world gets its distinction from three main canals, dug in the 17th century, that form concentric belts through the old downtown, which boasts 1550 monumental buildings. We enjoyed weaving our way along the numerous connecting canals and seeing the houseboats and old crooked warehouses, many of them refurbished as cool living spaces.   

Since we decided to forego the art scene and save the Van Gogh and Rembrandt museums for another time, the one place we really wanted to see was the Anne Frank House. A moderate queue and a look at some information in the museum's shop gave us time for a family history lesson on Anne Frank and WWII.

We saw the warehouse for Mr. Frank's former business and where the family's hideout was built in a secret rear annex. We walked through the offices where the refugees' only support worked by day and where Anne, her sister Margot, mother Edith, father Otto and four others would occasionally sneak by night. We walked past a reconstruction of the bookcase that hid the access panel to the annex and walked up the stairs to the tiny living space shared by eight people from July 6, 1942 until August 4, 1944 when the German police stormed in after an unidentified informer exposed them. It was difficult to place one's self in their shoes; terrified to cough, sneeze, flush a toilet or crack a window shade lest they be discovered and thrown to the Nazi devils; bored, trapped, alone, cramped and fearful for day upon day. While the annex is completely unfurnished, the walls and layout have remain unchanged and walking through Anne's bedroom with the pictures she pasted up on the wall still intact, seeing the map where Otto Frank marked the advancing Allied forces and the section of wallpaper where Anne and Margot's height was marked during their stay was very moving. The original diaries, handwritten in Dutch and spanning several books were also on display.

Anne Frank was important not only because she chronicled a chapter of world history from a viewpoint that usually goes unheard but more so because of the life, love, hopes and dreams for mankind she expressed so beautifully in spite of her dire circumstances.

No photography was allowed inside but here are the kids in front of the exterior of the warehouse right after our visit.

Next we took a relaxing one-hour boat tour through the canals and enjoyed learning about the grand buildings, beguiling houseboats and intricate bridges lining the channels.

Betsy slipped on her fabulous birthday gift, the shimmering Swarovski ring purchased that day from their Amsterdam retail store.

At one point, we consulted our GPS to determine which route we should take next to explore the city and decided on a corner that we hadn't reached previously. Three blocks later, we failed to notice the crimson light bulbs above the windows but we did see the woman in the window who was, as Vaughn put it, "pretending to be a mannequin but with no shirt on." As she pulled the curtain closed with a frown, we made a u-turn and made our way back towards more familiar territory.

Following our day in Amsterdam, two lazy days back at the De Haan resort with nowhere to be and nothing to do closed out our vacation. We bought a shovel for the beach and had a blast digging in the sand and leaping in the waves.

On Wednesday evening we enjoyed a visit from our friends Max, Els and daughters Jill and Anna -Paulina. A pizza feast, lots of laughs, and hopes for many reunions in the future preceded this beautiful sunset on the beach.  

After the two-hour dinner, the kids were eager to stretch their legs as we began to stroll around De Haan. Shortly after leaving the restaurant at dusk, all three kids ran around a corner and were clotheslined by an almost-invisible cable strung up between pillars at the bike-rental store shown in the second picture of this post. Xander took the worst of it on his neck and the height of the wire was evident as Vaughn got it on the nose and Quinn on her right eyebrow. 

We went to the floral police station and made a report so I'm sure the bike store got a stern reprimand in the morning. Of course, it took an some Americans sprinting blindly around a dark corner in an unfamiliar town to point out the problem, but we did our civic duty and - finally! - a Belgian cop wrote my information down in his little book. 

Thursday morning started early as we made our way to the airport first thing in the morning. One of our strategies was to put a packed suitcase inside an otherwise empty larger suitcase to make our return trip a little easier. It was a great idea that made packing easy but cramming everything into our little Skoda Octavia a lot like playing Tetris. Here's us pulling everything out upon arrival at the Brussels airport for our flight back home. Vaughn has the print we bought during our visit to Monet's house and gardens.

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This is the last installment of the Hughes on the Loose: Europe 2012 blog after 27 posts covering 44 days. We've had over 1900 page views and we're delighted our friends and family could share the true joys of Europe right along with us:

Our trip ended with our return to the Twin Cities on August 30. We will have to find a local resource for some of the thirty new varieties of beer we've sampled during our travels (several of them way more than once). The true highlights were our stays in London (during the Olympics!) and Paris, living in Brussels, the day trips to Amsterdam, Dinant and Monschau, seeing all the castles, walls, cathedrals, palaces and boobs, just being together and the countless little joys and discoveries that happened every day. 

goodbye laundromats, 

hello dishwasher

goodbye museums, 

hello classrooms

goodbye pigeons, 

hello piano

goodbye great beer everywhere, 

hello all English all the time

goodbye Bob l'eponge,

hello NFL

goodbye subways, 

hello Hopkins

goodbye cigarette butts, 

hello water fountains and trash cans

goodbye suitcases, 

hello baseball gloves

goodbye new friends, 

hello home

 Ha ha ha ha ha! Weiner Circus!

MUSEUMS & FOOD (DAY 23)

*Sigh* Another day, another round of museums, another delicious meal, another new beer.

Now at the halfway point of our European epic, we have settled into the advantageous routine of relaxed travel. The freedom we've had to leisurely enjoy Brussels and the surrounding towns instead of frantically barnstorming from sight to sight has made us realize that this, whenever possible, is the way to do it.

On Wednesday afternoon, the kids and I set off on foot to visit the Belgian Centre of Comic Strip Art and to see what we could see along the way. Just around the corner from La Cathedrale des Saints Michel-et-Gudule, we noticed signs for the gratis Museum of the National Bank of Belgium. Since the price was right, we went in!

Housed in the former headquarters of the bank, the museum walks visitors through the history of banking and money in Europe as well as a chronicle of the National Bank itself. We got to see the office of the governor of the bank, which had been left unchanged since the bank moved to its current location. Very fancy.

The most interesting exhibits for us included ancient coins and other items used as money over the centuries, examples of every different European currency replaced by the Euro and a hands-on display of the effects of inflation over the decades since 1860 on coal, meat, bread, butter, cheese and - of course - beer.

Bank documents from the rich and famous were also on display, including these papers ascribed to shareholder Victor Hugo, writer of Les Misérables and The Hunchback of Notre-Dame. The signed, handwritten note on the left is dated 1881. 

Next stop was the comic strip museum. Situated in the beautiful Art Nouveau setting of a Waucquez Warehouse once occupied by cloth wholesalers, the building was renovated in the late 1980's with several areas made in the fashion of notable interiors direct from the pages of the nation's most beloved comics. 

Needless to say, we made a beeline for the Tintin area where we enjoyed character charts, props from the stories, a display of Tintin collectibles through the years and biographical information on Georges Remi (switch the initials around and you get the authors pseudonym, Hergé - below, right). 

The museum also presents a history of the development of comics and a variety of other prominent authors and their characters. We were so motivated by our visit that we stopped by the Comics Cafe we visited on Day 3 to peruse their collection of books and enjoy the open selection of colored pencils and papers. Vaughn was so inspired that he ended up completing by the following morning a full comic book titled Alex's Advéntures.

As we walked back to the flat, we passed through the historic indoor shopping arcade called the Koninginnegalerij. Packed with opulent shops including a boutique entirely devoted to champagne and a purse store with one displayed in the window next to a 3,800€ price tag ($4,688!), the covered shopping street is thought to be the oldest in Europe (1847). I gave into temptation and purchased my first Belgian candy from somewhere besides a grocery store (all of which offer a vast array of excellent sweets) and we left with a box of sumptuous chocolate liqueurs. 

In the evening, we all went out to dinner with our friends, Carlos and Frank. We randomly picked an outdoor eatery by the bowling alley we intended to visit afterwards and enjoyed what will probably be our last extravagant meal out in Brussels. 

So I made sure it counted and satisfied my desire to enjoy a couple of national dishes with a big bowl of steamed mussels and an order of steak tartare, which is pretty much just a pile of finely chopped raw beef.

It was something I've always wanted to try and it made for a memorable meal. Both of the boys sampled a bite and I think they enjoyed it, but they tell me they wouldn't rush to find it again any time soon. The dinner was one of the best we've had, topping the the roasted quail stuffed with morel and sweetbreads I enjoyed two days prior. And now, I promise, no more foodie talk...for at least a few entries.

Finally I leave you to bask in our immature delight at some of the local art we passed during the day's wanderings. I'm not sure whether the guys below are wrestling or embracing, but at least they're naked. I also have no information on why the Weeble Wobble has her boobs out but she's clearly a hottie!

PORTE DE HAL, EVENING OUT, ANDERLICHT (DAYS 17,18)

On Thursday morning, we used the now-functioning washing machine in our parking garage to get through a couple of loads of laundry before finally exploring the Porte de Hal, a fortified gate just down the street from us that was built in 1381 as part of the the second city wall that once protected Brussels. The wall and the six other gates have long since disappeared, but this one survived through the years as a prison, customs house, granary, church and now a museum. The view on the left is the outside that once included a portcullis and drawbridge over a moat while the image on the right shows the city side. 

Around 1870, the inner tower and many embellishments were added including a vertigo-inducing spiral staircase surrounding by statuettes of knights and other medieval figures. Here's a view looking up from floor to ceiling, which I preferred over leaning out to get the opposing view.

The galleries included several suits of armor and a lot of weaponry including hand cannons, pikes, axes and crossbows as well as prison items such as the restraining devices and branding iron shown here.

We even got to try on some of the armor and practice doing battle with our souvenir swords. Here Xander illustrates the advantage of being right-handed on a spiral staircase designed to benefit the defending troops.

It was fascinating to see in person the clever ways the fortress was designed to help the people of Brussels defend themselves against external attacks in the Middle Ages. We enjoyed imagining fighting off invading troops by dropping stones and pouring boiling oil on their heads from the hatches built into the floors and towers.

The kids were much more willing than I to lean out for the archers' views of the city streets and they were very accommodating as I hugged the walls to traverse the walkways a dizzying five stories above the pavement below. 

Oddly, one floor was filled with an intriguing exhibit of wire-framed paper sculptures that, delightfully, included the figure below as well as a large, phallic dirigible hanging from the rafters.

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So an Australian, a Belgian, a Colombian and an American walk into a bar. The American says, "Let's order one of those beer towers!" Then, uh, well, that's all I can remember...

I enjoyed a fun guys' night out with friends Warren, Frank and Carlos on Thursday evening. We enjoyed some good food and drinks and a lot of laughs on the patio of an Irish bar overlooking the Brussels Stock Exchange building before grabbing some late-night fries on the way back home. My hosts made sure we stopped by the Jannekin Pis statue, a 1980's work of art (?) that serves as a sister to the famous Mannekin Pis. Here's a G-rated shot, courtesy of a well-positioned protective bar. 

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On Friday, confident we had truly conquered the mysteries of the Metro, the kids and I boarded a subway train to head west to visit a centuries-old Gothic house known as the Erasmus House. While we successfully navigated a line switch and ended up at the end of the track in Erasmus, I had neglected to confirm that the Erasmus house was actually in Erasmus. So after a brief, fruitless expedition through the town, I finally turned on my iPhone roaming feature to di$cover that we should have gotten off six stops earlier in Anderlecht. Fortunately, our brief visit wasn't a total loss as we got to see this mural on a bridge wall near the Metro stop. 

Upon arriving in Anderlecht, we raced through the streets to reach the museum before closing and were pleased to find that we had almost two hours to enjoy both the Erasmus House and the nearby Beguinage for one admission. A Beguinage is a small home constructed between 1252 and the 17th century for widows of crusaders and Catholic lay sisters known as Beguines. The house we saw dated from 1603 and included a variety of objects of archaeological and religious interest and local history artifacts documenting a thousand years of Anderlecht's past.

One object of special interest was this cabinet which holds a series of cut-out prints on horizontal slots to provide a three-dimensional image when viewed through a lens and mirror on the opposite side. While this offers a visitor of today little more than a moment's whimsy, it is easy to imagine the hours of entertainment this doubtlessly extravagant item of the time would have provided.

Next up was the Erasmus House, so called because of the brief period the classical scholar and humanist reformer Desiderious Erasmus Roterodamus (1466-1536) lived there.

As early as the 17th century people were making pilgrimages to the grounds which today shelter a museum, a study center with early manuscripts of Erasmus' works and a historical garden. The house has been restored to look the way it did in 1521, the year the Renaissance philosopher arrived, complete with creaky, uneven wooden floors and touches such as a servant's peephole and an outdoor fountain for carriage horses. 

A variety of artifacts are presented in the setting of ornate furniture and artworks. In addition to the paintings and sketches that tell the story of the man and his life, we enjoyed looking at shelf after shelf of ancient books, some displayed open with hand-written marginalia.

The garden behind the house was designed in the late 1980's around existing structures to provide a botanical history of the time. The beautifully manicured grounds include about a hundred medicinal plants that were commonly used in the 16th century as well as a series of cartographic flowerbeds designed to illustrate Erasmus' journeys and a philosophical area supposedly conducive to reflecting on the human condition. The kids found it more conducive to playing tag.

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I won't be forgiven if I fail to mention the lady who tried to cram herself into the closing doors of the subway on the way home. She ignored the many signs warning one not to do so and as the alarm sounded and the doors squeezed together she was stuck half in and half out. Without a word from anybody involved, two other passengers gave a half-hearted effort to prop the doors open. I was about to shove her out for her own safety since she was neither trying to extricate herself or slip through; she just kind of stood there looking around. Finally the mechanism forced the doors shut and she was ejected back onto the platform...but the sleeve of sweater that was tied around her waist was stuck in the door! I thought we were going to witness a death but we were all relieved to see the garment come loose as the train sped away with her sweater flapping in the breeze. It was surreal as no one else seemed to think it was much of a big deal but it served as a memorable safety reminder for the kids.

To end on a happy (and somewhat neurotic) note, we love the un-canned vegetables here that come in jars! We avoid canned food at home because BPA and phthalates from the plastic lining inside the cans can leach hormone-disrupting chemicals into the food. I hope that American suppliers make the switch soon.

We head off for a couple of day trips this weekend with Monschau, Germany on Saturday and Luxembourg City on Sunday. Read all about it right here!

MOVIE, BACK IN TIME & LAUNDRY (DAYS 9,10,11)

Perhaps our stomachs were feeling a bit homesick on Wednesday as we looked for a place to grab lunch before heading to the cinema. It was between a Pizza Hut lunch buffet (can't seem to find one near us in Minnesota) and a burger joint.

Despite the brown mustard and white cheese on the burgers (we wanted American cheese, damnit!) it hit the spot. Afterwards we opted for Madagascar 3 in French with no subtitles. Apparently they show movies here in English with subtitles for the first week or so until no one comes to those, then they only show the French versions. It was still funny but we definitely missed a few laughs. Figuring out the movie routine and purchasing the tickets, like every transaction I attempt to make here, was an ordeal. At home when I see someone who doesn't speak English struggling through such things they seem, well, stupid. Now that's me! Every day!

Case in point; our adventure on Thursday began at the train station with grand plans to rendezvous with our friend Frank in Tongeren, the "oldest city in Belgium." Betsy used her limited French to secure our tickets and escort us to the appropriate track at the appropriate time before bidding us farewell and heading to work. We boarded the train and sped off, waving and laughing as our journey got underway.

As Betsy started up the stairs, she saw another train pull in on the same track with its sign flashing TONGEREN. The train we were on had been late, messing up the schedule. Uh oh! She contacted a worker for help, who radioed the crew on our train. The kids and I were taking in the passing countryside when a conductor walked up to tell me to get my shoes off the seat (being comfortable is apparently another nasty American habit) and that I was on the wrong train. I'm not sure how long it would've taken me to figure out that we were speeding toward Luxembourg. A couple of stations later, we were finally on the right train and, about ninety minutes later, we were strolling through Tongeren with Frank.

Tongeren was wonderful. The city was founded in 15 B.C. as a base and supply station for Roman troops in the region. The statue above is of local legend and town symbol Ambiorix, an ancient Gallic chieftain and Hulk Hogan-lookalike who led the fight against Julius Ceasar's invading troops around 52 B.C. before fleeing across the Rhine as the Romans took power.

What is bound to be one of the highlights of our entire trip was our visit to the Gallo-Roman museum located in the heart of the city at the exact spot where a large, luxurious Roman villa once stood. The underground of Tongeren is one large archeological archive dating back 500,000 years and the museum sweeps visitors from Neolithic times through the stone and copper ages and up to Roman life 2,000 years ago.   

There were several great activities for the kids, beginning with a pretend archaeological dig site where we learned the proper techniques of unearthing, protecting and cataloging items. They also got to make Neanderthal-style amulet necklaces, paper Ambiorix and Roman soldier figures and replicas of Roman belt clasps.

We also enjoyed making friends with the realistic figures throughout the galleries.

Seeing the Roman artifacts was a dream come true. There were some amazing pieces that brought to life so many details about Roman artistry, technology, innovation and daily life that I'd only previously read about. We walked over an actual mosaic floor that once lay in a covered gallery of a luxury townhouse and saw remnants of a hypocaustum, an underfloor and inner-wall heating system.

Intricate items like hair pins, mirrors, cloak pins, jewelry, toiletry items and these delicate glass vials reveal the artistry and attention to detail of their makers.

The gallery is filled with fascinating items like statue and pillar fragments with images of gods and goddesses, often with inscriptions such as "To Vulcan. The Roman citizens of the centuria of Valentinus of the unit of the Gaesatae placed this stone."

We saw pipes for plumbing and lead bars for their manufacture such as this rare piece with the abbreviated inscription "Property of Emperor Tiberius Caesar Augustus, lead from Germania." Of all the objects ever found in Tongeren, this bar is the only object that is marked with the name of an emperor. 

A highlight for Frank was a display of the items found in nearby Heers just a few hundred meters from his childhood home. He was present as archaeologists unearthed items such as a bottle that still contained wine from the treasure-laden burial mounds of wealthy Roman families.

To see all of that in person served to reinforce the mystery of the middle ages, when all of these incredible advancements were swept aside by the conquering invaders at the fall of the Roman Empire. That we can so closely identify with these items and have seen the redevelopment of most of the technology is the theme of the museum, embodied by a quote that appears in a variety of languages in the entryway:

"What follows is always organically related to what went before..." 

- Marcus Aurelius, Roman emperor, 121-180 A.D.

The visit was capped off by the one thing I had to see before the end of our European travels; outdoor remnants of a Roman wall. A first wall was built around Tongeren to protect it from the Germanic tribes beyond the Rhine. A second wall was built in the 4th century, parts of which have still survived to this day. This section included the addition of turrets during medieval times for added protection, but the base of the wall and most of the bricks and mortar in it were about 1,700 years old.

We enjoyed giant sundaes on the idyllic town square as church bells rang every fifteen minutes to remind us to soak in the scene and appreciate how fortunate we are to be here.

On the way back to Brussels, we made a stop at Frank's house to meet his parents and his two dogs. The Schoofs tend a beautiful garden and enjoy the protection of Juanita, a behemoth great Dane who was thrilled to see the kids.

As I write this on Friday afternoon, we are about to pack up for a weekend sojourn to Brugge. We're excited to get out of the hustle and bustle of the city and into an air-conditioned hotel with a pool.

We woke up this morning with the one goal of finally getting our laundry clean before moving on to something fun. Unfortunately, the effort to get the wash done monopolized our day, knocking me off my Roman pedestal and back down to the level of befuddled foreigner. When we arrived last week and inquired about the facilities, we were told to look in the unit's parking garage around the corner but found all the doors locked. A few days later we finally got a key (they said they had forgotten they recently installed a lock on the door) and found out that we needed to get some proper change together. So today, with a deadline looming, we all got up early to walk down with Betsy and get the first load in. When the washer swallowed our Euros and failed to start, we removed all the soapy clothes and headed back up to the flat to wait for our contact to advise us. He then informed us that he forgot that the washer was broken and directed me to a laundromat about five blocks away. So the kids and I marched through the streets dragging a suitcase full of dirty clothes only to find a sign in French on the door telling us that the laundromat was closed each year from July 16-28. Lovely. A few texts and a map search revealed another possibility five blocks in the other direction. It was on a street we had started to go down several days earlier but turned around because we didn't feel too safe! Fortunately, it felt safer during daylight and my three patient helpers and I eventually returned "home" with a suitcase full of clean laundry six hours after our initial attempt. 

NATIONAL DAY: ATOMIUM, HASSELT, BOKRIJK & LIEGE (DAY 5)

Saturday was an intense day of country-wide sightseeing with a pair of excellent hosts, Betsy's Colombian co-worker Carlos (left) and his partner, Frank, a Belgian native. Both were eager guides with a lot of fascinating information and the day of adventure and conversation was even more special as it was National Day, the annual Belgian holiday much like our Fourth of July.  

The first stop was at the "symbol of Brussels," the Atomium - a monument originally built for the 1958 Exposition. It's a 335-foot tall structure made up of nine steel spheres connected to form the shape of an iron crystal magnified 165 billion times. We'll be back another day to visit the interiors of some of the spheres, which contain museums and a restaurant, but today we merely visited for a quick photo opportunity. Oddly, our quick stop was hijacked by a busload of Chinese tourists who insisted on having their pictures taken with our "beautiful babies." I freaked them out by speaking a little Chinese but then they freaked me out by handing me camera after camera as they cycled through, stepping up in small groups to pose with the little blonde Americans at the Belgian monument. Once we got rid of them, we finally had the opportunity to take a picture of our own.

We then began a weekend trend of getting off the usual tourist path with a visit to the city of Hasselt where we enjoyed a magnificent brunch at The Palace, a stunning restaurant in a building that used to house a branch of the national bank.

We enjoyed a luxurious meal in an opulent dining room filled with Moroccan chandeliers and gilded everything.

One of the vaults is now used as an extravagant cigar bar. The thick steel doors open to a room of indulgence, still surrounded by the original safety-deposit boxes, complete with keys sitting in many of the locks. Most are open but dozens remain sealed as the four-dial, A-Z combinations have been lost to history. Who knows what treasures are sealed within the locked boxes?!

A stroll through the ancient city gave us our first glimpse of some of the National Day festivities as this group of uniformed fellows strolled by the charming town square.

Our next stop was an interactive history park in Bokrijk, an open-air museum consisting of old Flemish buildings that make up a complete village from around 1850. Historical interpreters throughout the grounds recreate conditions of the time. The farmhouse below left with wattle and daub walls housed the animals on the ground floor while the upper levels were occupied by the family and their food stores. The walls are made of timber framing with thin sticks running from beam to beam and the spaces are filled in with mud mixed with straw. The centuries-old building in the background of the photo above was made the same way and it's still in great shape. This constable was very funny. He pedaled throughout the town admonishing people and made Carlos get his hands out of his pockets, an activity apparently frowned upon on this establishment. 

On Saturdays, the bakehouse produces several pies and loaves of bread which we had the opportunity to see in production but did not have the opportunity to sample.

A shepherd made his way into a nearby field with his crook and his faithful dog and we got right up close as the herd made its way toward us. It was cool to see a real sheepdog doing its thing in person and it was surprising how loud the chewing and grass-ripping of a herd of approaching ruminants can be.

We had a good seat in the church for the priest's sermon, during which (I think) we were all told what idle and immoral sinners we are.

We stopped in the town of Liege on the river Muese to see one of the oldest cathedrals in Europe but it was closed for the day so we sat at a cafe and had some beer instead. Then we made our way back to Brussels to catch up with the festivities of the big day. As we strolled toward the center of town we were swarmed by revelers and displays of both past and current Belgian military might.

A highlight was witnessing a group of revolutionary-era re-enactment soldiers firing their muskets on the Rue de la Regence.

As we made our way to our restaurant we passed tanks, a fighter jet parked on the street, every police vehicle imaginable and scores of proud soldiers of today's Belgian army.

At Chez Leon, we opted for as many authentic Belgian dishes as we could including mussels, meatballs in tomato sauce, fries, croquettes and our first foray into escargot. The snails were swimming in a lovely garlic butter sauce and Vaughn and I particularly enjoyed them. Betsy was bold enough to get one down but Quinn and Xander respectfully declined. Vaughn also loved the mussels and is eager for his next serving.

The fireworks bursting over the rooftops of the city followed by a street-side rendezvous with several of Betsy's friends from work capped a truly memorable day. We then went home and crashed until noon the next day. With the fading jet lag and the non-stop excitement of the day, Xander said later that Saturday night was the most tired he's ever been.