But in a stroke of pure coincidence, our good friend Nic Bouckaert had planned on stopping through Belgium to see his family in early December and invited us to join him at his grandfather's house. So, we tacked on a few days to the front of our trip and hopped on the Eurostar to Lille, the closest stop to his family's home.
Unfortunately, this trip in particular was marked by cold, rainy weather and dark days, so any shots I did get were taken at nighttime when it dried out and became safe to pull out my camera. Bouckaert picked us up at the train station and we jetted off to little Deerlijk, where his grandfather lives in a beautiful home. Honestly, one of the highlights of this trip for us was the great big bedroom, bathtub, and the comfiest bed we've ever slept on. So much more room than our little flat, which at this juncture seems to get smaller by the day!
After a nice afternoon walk around the family's property, Bouckaert took us to Kortrijk for dinner at tiny, charming Cyrano de Bergerac, where we ate a magnificent meal of red fawn and frites (with mayonnaise of course), and shared a most delicious Dame Blanche for dessert. The Dame Blanche - vanilla ice cream with dark hot Belgian chocolate sauce - is just about my favorite thing on this earth, and reminded me of its yummy Texas counterpart, Merm sauce! After dinner, we went for a few pintjes at a nearby pub and met Eduoard (who W&L grads might be interested to know is now known as the Eurotard throughout Belgium) and a few of his friends, one of whom is a talented emerging fashion designer in Belgium. She was lovely and we had a fun time talking fabrics!
The next day we went to Gent, a beautiful medieval town known for its:
enormous cathedrals,
towers and
a very cool fort.
It was an excellent night for unearthing treasures from Christmas past,
and walking the cobbly, Christmasy streets with an old friend.
We then set off for dinner with 7 or so of Bouckaert's 50ish Belgian cousins + their spouses. A fun treat and another delicious meal here, as well as pintjes and wine all around. A great big thank you to Bouckaert for having us, and showing us around beautiful Belgium!
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