Visiting Brussels was the longest stop on my road trip through the Benelux states. In French it is called Bruxelles, in Dutch Brussel and in German Brüssel. This multicultural background of Belgium is fascinating to me. This city has French as the main language but most of the citizens speak Dutch and English as well.

I had to park outside of the city, near the Atomium because in the city you can only use a car park for a lot of money if you want to park for a longer time without being a citizen. The hostel workers told me that around Atomium there are free parking spaces, unfortunately these times are long gone and due to the holiday first of May the few spots where I could park longer where blocked because of the parade. At the end I would have to pay 40€ for four days of parking. Luckily, I figured, that if I press “card lost” I only had to pay 25€ plus another couple of euros for the train to take me half an hour back to the hostel. I know, that’s not nice of me but I think they already earn enough from all the tourist parking there daily. In general, I didn’t have in mind all the parking costs that I would need to pay in the cities. For my next road trip, I will have them in mind. But the nights in the hostel saved up some money, so I could afford it. Additionally I mostly eat two out of three meals from bakeries or supermarkets to save up and then enjoy one nice meal or snack every now and then.

Atomium

My days in Brussels brought me some relaxing days as well because of the rain. Mostly it was just a drizzle but on Sunday it was more then that. After breakfast in the hostel, I figured everyone in my room was still sleeping and it was raining anyway so I decided to nap a bit. It ended by waking up at 1 pm from the cleaning lady entering the room which was empty by then. I have no clue when the others lef…, I guess my body needed the rest =D An error I always make traveling is not planning enough time to rest and process all the input I get. With the rain outside I could excuse it to myself to miss a day outside and just went to a café, did some laundry and went to bed early as well. At least I also had a hostel with a really nice and cozy lounge to relax. The next day I had power again to continue my journey. Still I had around two and a half days to explore this beautiful city:

Grand-Place

At this quare you just turn around amazed by all the bedautiful architecture with lots of unique details.

Manneken Pis

Why? I think this it what most people ask themselves when they follow the crowds and stand in front of this small sculpture…

Parc du Cinquantenaire

Parc de Laeken

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