Weekend at Don & Cathy's in Belgium

On Friday morning, we jumped on the Eurostar train to Brussels to spend the weekend at Don & Cathy's. We had a fun- and food-filled stay! We began the festivities (and the caloric intake) on Friday with a drinks stop at the Poechenellekelder cafe. Cheers! We each ordered a different type of beer, which in Belgium means that we each got a different type of glass -- with the glass shape and size designed to best suit the particular beer. From our table there we could see the famous Brussels landmark Manneken Pis -- the odd little statue of the boy urinating. We walked back to Don & Cathy's flat, where our most "foodie" friends served us a fantastic meal, beginning with homemade mushroom soup. The evening was topped off by a fashion show, with Don showing off his Bosnia card-playing "championship belt"...and D proudly modeling the ¾-length "capri pants" given to him by Don & Cathy, who knew that D had been wanting some since seeing so many British blokes wearing them. (It was an added bonus for everyone that I HATE men's capri pants! Hate. And you'll notice that D happily wore them the entire rest of the weekend....it just takes a little extra effort to really set me off!)Saturday dawned with blue skies and warm temperatures -- yea! We walked the short distance to the Royal Palace of Brussels. It is open to the public in the summer, and we took advantage of the opportunity for a tour. It's a beautiful building inside and out. Most of it is quite traditional, but the palace's one unusual feature is a room whose ceiling & chandelier are covered with the irridescent green wing cases of 1.4 million beetles. (There is a photo of the room here. Oddly beautiful.) The Brussels Summer Music Festival was underway while we were in town; we enjoyed the music and were amused by the enormous inflatable version of Manneken Pis on display as well! We stopped at a Friterie for some of the best fries on the planet. In Belgium, they are served with mayonnaise, not ketchup. (Believe me, it tastes far better than it sounds!) But that was just a snack on our way to get lunch -- chicken Doner Kebabs! Yum. Thank goodness we got chicken -- and not these! We made a stop at one of the many beer stores in town. D had thousands of beers to choose from...for the beer tasting back at Don & Cathy's later that afternoon. We enjoyed a stroll through the cathedral and past the main town square: before we went to dinner here: where freshly prepared tapas came around on a conveyor belt. Fun!On Sunday, we went to the Brussels "beach", a canal-front area where tons of clean white sand has been brought in and dozens of food stalls have been set up for the summer. And because we were with Cathy, of course we made it to the home of the best ice cream in Brussels. The owner is quite...temperamental. (Remember the soup guy from Seinfeld?) I very nearly got us all banned from the ice cream parlor for life by taking a photograph while in the shop. (Oh, would I have been in the doghouse with Cathy had a ban been imposed!) I was so busy trying to compose a shot to include both the list of flavors and Don & Cathy that I missed completely that the owner was admonishing me not to take the photo...so I took it. The "stop fingers" and the looks on the faces of my friends make me laugh every time I look at this: Can you tell that they were worried that their ice cream supply might be cut off? But lucky for me (and them!), ice cream guy forgave me and we lived to eat another cone. The flavor selection was so unusual (for example, Wasabi, which Don tried, and Toasted Sesame, which I tried) and oh so delicious! Depite my close call at the ice cream place, we hope to be invited back to Brussels again for further fun and gastronomy. Thanks for a great stay, guys!