Venice of the North

The next stop on our journey was Bruges, Belgium. It was another one of those fairytale European cities. I've never seen so many beautiful brick buildings. The canals made it even better and we were fortunate to have the weather on our side. The food was delicious and we saw a lot of the city on our canal boat tour. The kids were happy because they didn't have to go inside any museums and they were able to eat fries for a snack and waffles for lunch.

Henry's first look at Bruges

The streets of Bruges heading toward Market Square

The first thing we did in Market Square was stand in line for some fries

Pete and the kids sampling Bruges' famous fries with gravy

The Bell Tower in Market Square has 366 steps up to the top.
Pete was up for the challenge but unfortunately had no takers.

Henry, Pete and Christina in front of the Bell Tower

Market Square

We stopped for lunch to try some real Belgian waffles

Strawberries and whipped cream, yum!

Bananas and whipped cream, double yum!

There are plenty of chocolate shops in Bruges.
Alex had a good time taking pictures of all the interesting treats.
Here you can see a giant chocolate Easter bunny.

Chocolate fondue tower

I thought this was the coolest one.
It is a giant Chinese dragon made entirely of chocolate.

The chocolate shop we stopped in was Dumon.
The chocolate there was amazing.

A family shot on a canal boat

Pete and Ruby

Henry

Alex

The Church of Our Lady which is home to Michelangelo's sculpture "Madonna and Child".
After our boat tour we headed over there to check it out for ourselves.

Going under an extremely low bridge

Loved the brick work...

...and the windows

A shot of the bell tower

Henry, Ruby and Alex with the bell tower in the background

Family shot in Bruges