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Tuesday, October 25, 2005
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Monday, October 24, 2005
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Sunday, October 23, 2005
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The Eiffel on my way home



Yatches at Oostend



Madonna and the Child



The Cathedral



Occupants of the Canal



Canals of Brugge



Brugge Bell Tower

"Images of Belgium" by nmk
Friday, October 14, 2005
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Continuing in my travelogue series I went to Belgium last weekend. Its a very nice country and the people are friendly. I didn't venture into Brussles; had enough of big cities and wanted to get some quiet time in the smaller cities near the coast.

Day 1

Travelled from Stuttgart to Paris. I had to go through Paris as I had already booked rail tickets with the intention of going to Marseille through Paris. I could not find accomodation in Marseille in the last minute and decided to change destinations and go to Brugge in Belgium instead. Brussles and Brugge are close to Paris (1, 2 hours by train respectively) and there is a very convenient night train between Paris and Stuttgart.

Ended up in Brugge around 10.30 am and went to my hostel to store my bags there. Nice place, clean and comfortable, though the fecilities were a bit old and the staff non responsive. One of the first things you notice in is that a lot of Belgians can speak 3 languages (French, Dutch and English Fluently). This was a welcome change after France.

Brugge is (boastfully) called the venice of the north (not that I have been to Venice, but Brugge is pretty small). Its a beautiful and charming little city and is a pleasure to walk through. The streets are filled with the smells of Waffles and Chocolates and the weather is mild and refreshing.

The first thing I did was to take a boat tour of the canals. The guide was very helpful and pointed out thge various sites and monuments that we passed through. After the boat tour I walked to each of the monuments I had seen and went in.

The highlight of Brugge is a huge bell tower that is 3-400 years old and is very beautifully preserved. For a fee you can climb the tower and the view is supposed to be good (never found out, the queue was too long). The other monuments of Brugge are a couple of very beautiful churches.

One of them called the Church of Madonna and the Child (Actually the church is called something like Our Lady of Faith or something like that, but most people just call it Madonna and the child) is named after a famous sculpture present in the church which was done by Michaelangelo (need spellcheck). It is aparently one of the very few statues by the artist to leave italy in his lifetime and was part of an unfinished series of 12 similar statues. The statue itself is small but beautifullf crafted. Not earthshakingly beautiful, but serene and definitely worth a visit.

After that I just wandered around the city, walking into parks and aimlessly meandering among the canals. There is nothing much to see in Brugge, but it is a great place to just take a long walk and Relax.

Day 2

On Sunday I decided to go to the coast. The city of Oostend is just 15 minutes by train from Brugge and has a beautiful cathedral and some verv good beaches. Went to the cathedral first. It was built in the Gothic style (I cannot describe the styles but usually I can recognize a particular style if I see it). It was rather ordinary on the outside and not particularly grand. On the inside it was pretty normal, until you noticed the stained glass windows. The windws were spectacular. The designs, colours and motifs were beutiful and the sun was shining through them creating multicoloured images on the walls.

Excellent stained glass work seem to have been a hallmark of french and dutch church builders. The Notre Dame in Paris also has some exquisite stained glass windoes (probably more intricate than the ones in Oostend cathedral), but the colours in Oostend seemed bolder and more powerful.

After the cathedral, I wandered around the city center a bit and tried the waffles (which are very good) and longingly walked past the chocolate shops. Both Brugge and Oostend are filled with chocolate and candy shops and the variety is absolutely amazing. Its as if a Leonidas was on every street corner (On one of the corners, there was a Leonidas). The veriety and intricate work on most of these chocolates was great.

finally I decided to take a long walk on the beach. The weather was breezy and cool and the sky clear and blue. I walked for the better part of 4 hours and absolutely enjoyed it. The beach is regularly interrupted by old stone piers (now disused) which go into the sea. The view is good and the walk is lovely. There were also a fair number of yatches on the bay and they looked fantastic. I had gone sailing for a day a month or so ago and the experience is pretty much unforgettable.

At the end of a long and tired day I caught a train to Brussles and then to Paris. I had a couple of hours to kill before my train to Stuttgart and decided to go visit the Eiffel Tower once again. It looked great i the twilight and I really wanted to go up the tower, the que however was too long and I was way too tired to wait. Found a cosy cafe and spent the next couple of hours reading The Dream Merchants (Brugge has some very nice and very cheap second hand book stores) which seems promising so far. Finally I caught the night train and headed home.

Belgium is a great place to visit, if you are not looking for something to do but just relax and enjoy the cities and the casual almost lethargic way of life. Fortunately thats exactly what I needed.

Will try and put up some snaps soon.

"Travelogue to Belgium" by nmk
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
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St Peters Bascilica



Eye of the Pantheon



Forum Romanum



The Pantheon



Grave of the Unknown Soldier

"Images of Rome" by nmk
Monday, October 10, 2005
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Been doing a bit of travelling on the weekends and last weekend I was in rome. Its a fantastic city and a very beautiful one too.

Day 1 (Saturday)

I really wanted to go to the Vatican Museum and see all the paintings (the sistine chappel as well) but when I got there the queue to get in was 1 km long and the museum was open only for half the day (cos it was a saturday, they are closed on sundays except the last sunday of the month). So I decided to ditch the museum and go to the St. Peter's Bascilica instead. Its a beautiful church, though some of the smaller churches in Rome are more elegant. The highlight of the trip to the bascilica was the climb to the top of the dome. For a pretty reasonable fee of 4 euro (and an hour long queue) you get to climb to the top of the dome and get a fantastic view from the top. The climb is also a lot of fun, as part of the stairway is embedded in the dome (i.e. a part of the dome is actually not solid but made up of an inner and an outer layer, and between the 2 layers is the stairway.).
Midway to the top of the dome in the open roof of the church and you can get a good view of rome, you can buy post cards and stamps (vatican city has its own postal system) and also get some ice creams.

After the St. Peter's Bascilica, I decided to see the Trevi Fountain. Went by train to a station called Berberni which is next to the Fountain of Triton. Saw the fountain of triton, found my way to the trevi fountain (was easy, all I had to do was follow the crowd). The trevi fountain is very beautiful and very well preserved. Threw in the coins, and found a very good ice cream shop right next to the fountain that sells cheap, good and huge ice creams.

From the Trevi fountain, I went to the Pantheon. This is the most amazing thing in rome as far as I am concerned. Its not really big, and its something that a decent construction firm today would be able to build in less than a year (by decent I mean a singaorean construction firm not an indian one). The fact that this building was built a couple of thousand years ago and is so fantastically well preserved is a marvel. The eye (openning at the top, circular and about 9m in diameter) is fascinating. When it rains water comes into the pantheon and drains through 24 small holes in the center. The Pantheon was a pagan temple that was converted to a church about 500 years ago. The light coming through the eye and casting a beam on the walls is a fantastic sight.

From the Pantheon I went to a pretty square filled with fountains called Piazza Novona (The Fountain of Four Rivers by Bernini where the last cardinal is drownedin Angels & Demons is here), and then went to the Tomb of the unknown soldier (which is so big, I first thought it was the parliament building). Then I walked past the Foro (forum) Romanum and spent the evening gazing at the Colosseum and the Palentine hill.

Day 2 (Sunday)

Got up relatively early on day 2 to beat the crowds at the Colosseum, when I got there they were just openning and there were very few people around. Went in and walked around for a bit. Its a beautiful structure (though half in ruins) and in its heyday, would have been truely fantastic. Aparently in ancient times the arena could be flooded and ship battles were staged. Spent most of the morning there.

After the colosseum I went to see the Forum Romanum. This is a collection of ruins near the Colosseum which provide some insight into the buildings that would have once stood here. Most of the structures still standing are just columns and foundations. The size of these buildings is really immense. After the forum I went to the Palentine hill. This is also a collection of ruins of the palaces of the roman kinds and emperors, which sit on a hill overlooking the forum, the colosseum and the circus maximus.

From palentine hill I walked to cricus maximus. What is left of the circus is only a large (really large 500m x 100m) square patch of sunken grass land. This circus was once a huge arena where chariot races (like the ones depicted in Ben Hurr) were held. Today it looks like a large meadow.

From the circus, which is close to the river Tiber, I crossed the river and walked along the river to the Vatican City. I went to Castle St. Angelo (The Illuminati Lair for Angels Demons Fans) which is on the banks of the Tiber and from the roof of the castle caught the sunset and a view of St. Peter's Bascilica lit up. Finally I walked to St Peters Square once more and walked around the fountains and the obelisk once again.

Day 3 Monday

I left rome on Sunday night and arrived at Innsbruck in Austria on Monday morning. Went the Alpen Zoo (Alpine Zoo, was a rather sad experience, most of the animals seemed to be in a shabby state) and also to a small town called HungerBerg. It was pretty cold and the weather was windy and wet. Left around midday to getback to Stuttgart.

That in short was my weekend. Rome is a great place to visit and definitely beats both London and Paris hands down. My site is going from a photoblog to a travelogue, I shall hopefully reverse that trend soon.

"Rome" by nmk
Wednesday, October 05, 2005
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