Trying all the Belgian Staples

 May 27, 2026

We decided to day trip to Bruges, Belgium. We took the train and used our newfound hack- instead of walking 30 minutes to the train station on the other side of town, walk 10 minutes to the stop closest to us and board there. It's also in a much cleaner, cuter part of town, so wins all around! After about an hour on the train we stopped for morning chocolate because the train station in Bruges had a chocolatier. We did have a 20 minute walk ahead of us after all! 

We walked while enjoying our chocolate and once we got into town were AMAZED by the number of chocolate shops. We decided to do a self guided chocolate tour and stopped in and out of many different shops. Our favorite, by far, was Sweet Home Shop. 

Then we visited the main square where we did a quick pass through the Wednesday Farmer's Market. Everything looked SO fresh! 

We then headed to Chocolate Story, a chocolate museum with chocolate making demos and tastings. It was fine, but we enjoyed our self guided tour more. 

In addition to chocolate and fries, Belgium is also known for lace. In fact, there's even a map of the town made from lace on display along the canal. We went into a few lace shops and found a super cool one that had vintage and antique lace in display cases in the basement. 

After doing some shopping we walked to the canal for a 30 minute canal cruise. Our guide was so knowledgeable and was delivering the tour in not 1, not 2 but 3 different languages- English, Dutch and French. It was a lot to listen to. 

After the tour we decided to check out something else Belgium is known for- waffles. Mom was able to get gluten free waffles on a stick dipped in chocolate (she was very excited about this) while dad, Evan and I got waffles topped with different condiments. 

After our quick bite we walked to De Halve Maan for a brewery tour. We were told that the tour consisted of over 230 steps, which required the participants to go backwards down ladders, spiral up staircases and balance on tiny rungs. Mom and dad decided to opt out of the tour part and just sit in the garden of the brewery while Evan and I did the climbing. There were SO MANY cool facts that were shared during this tour, including:

• a map of the miles and miles of pipes that are installed under the public roads to pump the beer from the brewery to the bottling plant located on the industrial side of town
• during the process the brewery reuses 70% of the water and the other 30% gets used for toilet flushing
• during the fermentation process the heat that's given off is captured and recycled to heat nearby homes
• in earlier years, workers used to have to climb into the vats to clean them. while 1 worker cleaned 1 was always left outside the vat to talk to the cleaner. if the cleaner stopped responding the person on the outside had to go in and hoist them out
• there used to be a coal room that helped fuel the process. it was SO HOT in there that workers went in, shoveled one scoopful and came back out to cool off before going in again
• the brewery sponsors a lot of sports teams so their production of NA beers has skyrocketed in the last 5 years

The rooftop of the brewery has a really great view of the whole city (we could even see mom and dad in the garden from up there!) When we finished the tour we were given samples of 5 different beers which were all so tasty. 

Earlier in the day, when we were at the first chocolate shop, we were told that only some Belgian chocolates are fit for royalty and therefore contain the royal seal of Belgium. Evan was intrigued and decided we had to try the royal chocolates, so while we sipped on beers he raced against the clock to the royal chocolate shop. He bought many chocolates for us to try. 

After Evan returned with the chocolates we headed back to the train station and luckily got seats on the return trip home. While it should have been an hour, there were many delays so it ended up taking us closer to 2 hours to get home.

 Mom and dad were tired by the end of it so we walked them back to the Airbnb and then Evan and I stopped at an outdoor cafe for a late dinner. We tried 3 traditional dishes- moules frites, rabbit saddle in cherry beer stew (this was SO tasty and one of our faves from Belgium!) and finished with a waffle for dessert. It was such a beautiful evening and we really enjoyed sitting outside people watching before heading to bed in our attic apartment.