Gent

Buildings in Gent

In English we often see it written as Ghent.

This week of the trip hasn’t gone to plan per se as already noted. There originally was an extra day in this portion of the trip, but the “industrial action” also stripped that away. Originally we were going to go to Kōln, a city on the Rhine with a beautiful cathedral. By high speed rail it is almost two hours away. It’s also €78 per person each way for the cheapest tickets which leave Brussels at 10:45 AM and returns at 9:35 PM. With kids being pretty tired by then and still needing to get back to the hotel from the train station, plus pack for the departure the next day, it seemed like doing something else might be a better option. So we decided to see Gent instead, which is only a ½ hour away on an Inter City train, and is somewhere Darrell hasn’t been to before.

In the 13th century, Gent was the second largest city in Europe. Also, the Treaty of Ghent officially ended the War of 1812 between England and the U.S. Gent is an interesting city with a lot of interesting architecture. We found it to be not as cute as Brugge, but there is plenty to see here and we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves. In the middle of the city there is s castle as well. Quite fun to go through and the kids thoroughly enjoyed themselves, except in the torture chambers.

After exploring the city and the castle, we took a tour boat around, learning more of the history and about many of the buildings along the canal. Then some ice cream, Belgium waffles, and dinner, then back to Brussels where we watched the Belgium vs. USA game and went to bed.

Unfortunately, several if the photos on the point-and-shoot are over exposed. More photos will have to come from the DLSR camera after we get back as there was so many interesting buildings to take pictures of. Some of the best ones from the canal are the ones that are over-exposed.

St. James Church

Gent Skyline

Castle of the Counts

Inside Castle of the Counts