Morning in Leuven

I got up at 9:00 after a good sleep and went downstairs to have breakfast: fresh bread and butter and some grapes. They had seeds, which was unusual, but they were delicious. After breakfast, I chatted with Ashley's mom, Allison, until Ashley and Alex woke up. We threw in a load of laundry from the last few days, got dressed, and hopped in the car and drove to Leuven. Leuven is Allison's favorite town in Belgium. It's a university town with a great old downtown. We checked out a store with really novel household items, like salt shakers that look like little men and pizza cutters that look like flamingos. We left when the shopkeeper was annoyed with Alex for touching the items. The PLASTIC items. Whatever! Next we stopped in at the Grasshopper, an adorable toy store with all sorts of incredibly expensive cute toys. We had lunch outside at the Brasserie Notre Dame in the Gross Markt of Leuven. The Gross Markt in Leuven is like the one in Brussels in that it is surrounded by huge gorgeous churches and old guildhalls and the ground is covered with cobblestones. A guy was actually strolling around with an accordion. It was awesome! Ashley and I had spaghetti Bolognese, which they make here with ground beef as well as chopped vegetables. Allison had mushroom toast, sort of an open-face mushroom and cheese sandwich. Alex had chicken and frites and a little bit of everyone else's food. Of course!

After lunch, we drove to the south end of Leuven to visit the Grote Beguinhof, which was built in the 1200s as a sort of cloister to protect unmarried women during times of war. They have kept it totally like it was back then, so walking through it is like going back in time. There are narrow cobblestone passageways that are just a maze among all of the brick buildings. As everywhere in Belgium, there were beautiful flowers all over the place. Alex and Ashley and I explored it for about half an hour, literally smelling the roses along the way. We met Allison, who was relaxing and having some mineral water at the Cafe Del Sol (hahaha!) and went back to the car.

They have kept it totally like it was back then, so walking through it is like going back in time.