My first stop in Belgium was the medieval city of Ghent, about an hour from Brussels on the train. One of the many great things I was to discover about Belgium is that a train ticket basically anywhere in the country only costs 6.50 E!!! There are also trains about every 30 minutes so it’s very easy to travel around. I spent the night in Ghent and the next morning touring around, before catching a train to Bruges.
My hostel was located across the “moat” (can you believe it!) from the 12th century Het Gravensteen, or Castle of the counts. This was a very cool castle to visit – inside they had an impressive collection of arms and armour and an exhibit on medieval torture methods – I won’t go into detail on those! I learned a few interesting things in the armour exhibit – ‘wavy’ or ‘squiggly’ swords were used for getting between the cracks of a knight’s armour and ripping it off, and swords with square ends were used for executions.
Het Gravensteen.
One of the medieval halls.
Loved this hall!
The historic centre of Ghent consists of 13th and 14th century buildings, from when Ghent was a major centre of the cloth trade. Back during this period, Belgium was a superpower! The consequence today of this prosperity is that there is a plethora of beautiful medieval buildings. Belgium also saw an industrial revial during the 18th and 19th centuries, so there are some architechtural contributions from this period as well, but this is more obvious in Brussels.
Houses on a canal.
Houses on a canal.
View of the city from Het Gravensteen.
View of the city from Het Gravensteen.
Many of the nicest buildings in Ghent are located on the Graslei and the Korenlei canals, which are lined with beautifully preserved medieval guildhalls. I love how intricate some of the facades are, it looks like the buildings are covred in stone lacework. Speaking of lace, Belgian lace is pretty well known, and there are different patterns for each city.
There are chocolate shops on every block in the historic centre, and it’s definitely one of the perks of visitng Belgium! I’m afraid I’ve ruined myself for normal chocolate now, Beligian chocolate certainly lives up to its reputation!
Chocolate shop - you can watch them make it right in front of you!
Lots of people riding bikes in Ghent. When you travel, it's interesting to compare how much people bike in different cities. For example, in Copenhagen there were swarms of cyclists, while in eastern Europe there were very few.
Bike racks at the train station. Better remember where you parked it!
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