Day 2: Bruges Christmas Market

Christmas Toys, Christmas Market, Bruges
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Thank heavens for travel kettles and sachets of coffee & milk. Having woken up at about 6.30 and chatted for a bit, Linda and I had a leisurely start to the morning without having to rush down to get a drink. Departure time for the excursions is 9am so we decided to breakfast at 8am. So did everyone else. Rhonda later suggested that we might want to breakfast a little earlier as the hotel is full. We had the standard western European hotel breakfast fare – fruit juice, cereal, fruit, rolls, pain au raisin and pain au chocolate, ham, cheese. There were also facilities for boiling eggs yourself. A container of boiling water with six wire hangers for the eggs, each with a different coloured handle so you could keep track of your own.

Christmas Chocolates
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We were all on the bus and away just after nine (Rhonda, the guide, was the late one). Bruges is a gorgeous medieval town and the coach cannot take us all the way into the old part of Bruges where the market is held. Rhonda told us that we could take a number 12 bus or follow her for a twenty minute walk to the market. She gave us walkers directions to the market because, she says, she usually starts out with twenty or so following her and has only two or three still with her when she arrives at the market. Linda and I started out following her along the river and through the beautiful medieval streets. We stopped for photos along the way and did eventually lose her.

Christmas Chocolates in Bruges
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We popped in to a craft shop because a couple of cross-stitch pictures inside had caught my eye. We asked the very friendly salesman to show us the kits and left having bought one of the kits, a packet of 'brilliant' coloured threads and two variegated threads (me) and half a dozen balls of three very interesting yarns (Linda) to make up in a manner that the salesman demonstrated. As he showed us yet more new and interesting things Linda told him 'you are very naughty'. Smiling, he replied 'I think my English is not too good, I do not understand that. If you tell me I am a good salesman, that I do understand'. He told us about a customer, a teacher of tatting, who said he showed people what they asked for, which established that he had that, then showed them what was new. Last week she was in and bought so much of the new stuff that she forgot to buy the stuff she came in for and had to come back.

Horse & Carriage, Bruges
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Purchases made, we wandered on to the market, past chocolatiers selling all kinds of interesting goodies from the festive to the rude. We had a nice wander, stopping and browsing, window shopping, buying chocolate and taking photographs as we went along. Eventually we came to the main square where the market was held.

Shortly after we arrived it started to sleet and then we had hailstones. About ten minutes later the sun came out and lit up the old buildings. Fortunately, we were well wrapped up and both had hoods on our coats – just as well as this pattern continued for the rest of the afternoon. The stalls were a similar mix to those we had seen before and we enjoyed chatting with some of the stall holders.

Dark sky over Lille
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Rhonda had mentioned three things to look out for, apart from the market. A church which housed a statue by Michelangelo. We didn't find it but I'd been to Italy and seen lots of this stuff just a few weeks before and Linda wasn't too bothered either. The Belfry Tower which was a landmark and from which we could take lots of great photographs. We didn't feel in the mood for a climb so gave that a miss. The Christmas shop – we followed her directions and couldn't find it. We checked each corner in case we had mistaken left for right. Nothing. Chatting later with some of the others on our bus it turned out that none of us had found it. She also told us about an ice sculpture exhibition, next to the railway station and not too far from where we were to rejoin the coach. Linda and I decided we'd rather like to see this and thought that we would walk to the market and get the bus back and head for the exhibition. However, as we wandered back in the direction of the station we found ourselves almost there before we found a bus stop. The sun was shining again by now and it was a pleasant walk. Fortunately, Linda has a better sense of direction than I do or I would have got lost. We were accompanied for the last part of the walk by an English girl who asked directions to the train station. She had a few days annual leave left and had taken the Eurostar to Brussels the previous day then caught a train to Bruges toady. We told her about the ice sculptures and she was pleased to find she had enough time to take a look