Bye-bye Gent!
Feb. 20th, 2011 10:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
janestarzAfter breakfast, Nathreee and myself packed our bags and checked out of the hotel. Since Nathreee had a terrible urge to eat waffles, and I can only indulge her in these kinds of things, we visited the place our guide had recommended the previous day.
Max was the guy who invented the Belgian waffle. Normally you see the Luikse Wafel, a sugary contraption hardly worth its sugar*. But Max was the guy who made it all better.
His descendants still run the shop, and it sounded like the perfect place to go for a true Belgian waffle after our Gent adventure.
The Jugendstil decor of Max' coffee parlour.
We could do worse than to have a good cup of coffee at this lovely restaurant, so we took our time. The man behind the counter wore a striped vest, spectacles on the very tip of his nose, and a long white apron. He sat us down and busied himself over a pair of the most yummy capuccino's I've seen.
Belgians, loving all things edible**, spice up this Italian drink by replacing the foamed-up milk with whipped cream.
The man behind the counter slipped the glasses into silver cups, and served them with a flourish...
We sauntered over the square in front of the St.Baafs cathedral (and our hotel) for a bit, being approached by a local. "Tourists?" he asked, pointing towards the honking glass in front of my face. I lowered the camera. "What gave it away?"
The man smiled in a most friendly fashion, and pointed towards the building I'd been taking a snapshot of. "See that? The crown heads of Europe. Look to the window there. It's a women. Who do you think it is?"
We said we didn't know. "Wilhelmina!" he exclaimed. "Well, good day!" and he cycled off.
Fancy that, seeing the late queen-mother on architecture in for'n parts!
It was an attitude many Gent people had. The day previous a man had come up to us during the tour to tell us a joke about Jacob van Arteveld's statue. They are proud of their city and the rich history and culture it brings.
But in the end we went back to Iota, who survived his stay in the fish section of the parking with only a flapped mirror on the left-hand side. Carefully we rolled over the cobbles, setting a course for Antwerp, and then Nijmegen.
We arrived in time for Nathreee to say hello to her dear husband, who would be gone for the rest of the day. But Remco wasn't the only one who had missed her, because there was a very disgruntled Basement Cat that needed the cuddles more than we did...
I soon set my course home, driving nearly the width of the Netherlands and nearly making it to 500 kilometers in a weekend before I got home.
NoKey had been quite miserable without me, or so I think because he hasn't actually said so, but he greeted me with a heart-felt mewl of sorrow. The blueberry marmelade I had bought him in Gent was greeted with nearly as much enthusiasm.
I still needed to care for the necessities. With Palanthe off snowboarding in Austria, I promised to feed her kitties. Dinah and Lucifer were easy, though I had to tell Lucifer to keep to his own food a few times. By the time I left, a mewling Kreacher came up for food as well, and I locked my bike on the spot to return with her for some much-needed foods and cuddles too.
By the time I'm typing this, it's high time for me to find my own dear bed again, but I leave you with the set of pictures on Flickr to enjoy. Read the descriptions too, Gent's history is too rich to write down in a blogpost, but little bits have been added to the various pictures in this set.
I am very glad we went to Gent, it was a great experience, very relaxing and a lot of fun***.
----
*) Oodles of it.
**) and inedible. And fungoid. And containing any kind of alcohol.
***) [Dwarfspeak] Haal je baard uit de kaas! Je weet toch: die bijt!
Max was the guy who invented the Belgian waffle. Normally you see the Luikse Wafel, a sugary contraption hardly worth its sugar*. But Max was the guy who made it all better.
His descendants still run the shop, and it sounded like the perfect place to go for a true Belgian waffle after our Gent adventure.
The Jugendstil decor of Max' coffee parlour.
We could do worse than to have a good cup of coffee at this lovely restaurant, so we took our time. The man behind the counter wore a striped vest, spectacles on the very tip of his nose, and a long white apron. He sat us down and busied himself over a pair of the most yummy capuccino's I've seen.
Belgians, loving all things edible**, spice up this Italian drink by replacing the foamed-up milk with whipped cream.
The man behind the counter slipped the glasses into silver cups, and served them with a flourish...
We sauntered over the square in front of the St.Baafs cathedral (and our hotel) for a bit, being approached by a local. "Tourists?" he asked, pointing towards the honking glass in front of my face. I lowered the camera. "What gave it away?"
The man smiled in a most friendly fashion, and pointed towards the building I'd been taking a snapshot of. "See that? The crown heads of Europe. Look to the window there. It's a women. Who do you think it is?"
We said we didn't know. "Wilhelmina!" he exclaimed. "Well, good day!" and he cycled off.
Fancy that, seeing the late queen-mother on architecture in for'n parts!
It was an attitude many Gent people had. The day previous a man had come up to us during the tour to tell us a joke about Jacob van Arteveld's statue. They are proud of their city and the rich history and culture it brings.
But in the end we went back to Iota, who survived his stay in the fish section of the parking with only a flapped mirror on the left-hand side. Carefully we rolled over the cobbles, setting a course for Antwerp, and then Nijmegen.
We arrived in time for Nathreee to say hello to her dear husband, who would be gone for the rest of the day. But Remco wasn't the only one who had missed her, because there was a very disgruntled Basement Cat that needed the cuddles more than we did...
I soon set my course home, driving nearly the width of the Netherlands and nearly making it to 500 kilometers in a weekend before I got home.
NoKey had been quite miserable without me, or so I think because he hasn't actually said so, but he greeted me with a heart-felt mewl of sorrow. The blueberry marmelade I had bought him in Gent was greeted with nearly as much enthusiasm.
I still needed to care for the necessities. With Palanthe off snowboarding in Austria, I promised to feed her kitties. Dinah and Lucifer were easy, though I had to tell Lucifer to keep to his own food a few times. By the time I left, a mewling Kreacher came up for food as well, and I locked my bike on the spot to return with her for some much-needed foods and cuddles too.
By the time I'm typing this, it's high time for me to find my own dear bed again, but I leave you with the set of pictures on Flickr to enjoy. Read the descriptions too, Gent's history is too rich to write down in a blogpost, but little bits have been added to the various pictures in this set.
I am very glad we went to Gent, it was a great experience, very relaxing and a lot of fun***.
----
*) Oodles of it.
**) and inedible. And fungoid. And containing any kind of alcohol.
***) [Dwarfspeak] Haal je baard uit de kaas! Je weet toch: die bijt!
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no subject
Date: 2011-02-20 10:36 pm (UTC)You are an excellent storyteller. Thanks for sharing!!
no subject
Date: 2011-02-21 07:34 am (UTC)I bought a tin of waffles as a souvenir for my mother-in-law so perhaps I'll have the pleasure of tasting them again some time soon.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-20 10:37 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-21 07:24 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-21 07:31 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-21 07:33 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-02-21 11:48 am (UTC)Sounds like you had a lot of fun.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-21 07:54 pm (UTC)Especially the Max shop. Although I'm waiting to see a big Daddy enetering from around the corner. It's just the right ambiance.