My wife and I are planning a trip to Belgium this fall. We’ve only gone to one travel agent so far, and she was clueless. Anyone have any recommendations for traveling to Brussels and Bruges, or know where we can find some pertinent info?
“Around Brussels/Brugge in 80 Beers” - I bought the Brussels version before our trip and its perfect for traveling without a tour group.
My personal fav’s:
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Cantillon: spend a whole afternoon in the cafe, drinking bottles you can’t buy and eating Gueuze sausage.
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Delirium Cafe upstairs: FRESH Dupont on tap is an eye-opening experience.
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Moeder Lambic: Belgian craft beer bar. Ridiculous stuff on draft (4 Cantillon casks when I was there)
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A La Becasse: clay pitchers of slightly-sweetened lambic from cask
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A la Mort Subite: we stumbled across this one on a walk. Beautiful building. Mort Subite brands are mostly the faux/sweetened lambic, but their Gueuze is legit.
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Bia Mara: Fantastic fish n’ chips, De La Senne beers
There’s also a bottle shop near Grand Place (Beer Temple?) so you can stuff your suitcase if you have room after all the Loons.
There were some lambic breweries on the outskirts of town (3F, Boon), but we didn’t venture outside the city. Most Belgian breweries aren’t set up for walk-up business: tours are for large groups, scheduled way in advance. Cantillon is an exception, and its in the heart of Brussels.
This is exactly what I was looking for!
Sorry, I have been to Bruges but do not remember anything, The beer is way too good. ;D
What kind of recommendation are you looking for? Breweries? Bars? restaurants? hotels?
It is an adult Disney Land, you will not have any problems finding something to do even if you have no predetermined plans. No shortage of beer or bars or food.
Watch the movie “In Bruges” with Colin Farrell. It is a dark movie but it really shows you the scenery.
Here is a good resource for breweries:
I went with the family so did not get to visit any breweries, but will next time.
Sorry to derail, but if the color ‘green with envy’ came through the forum, I’d look like a field of shamrocks. Hopefully, I’ll be reviving this thread in a couple years. Just saying I like Belgian beer pretty well.
Hotel suggestions would be great. Love the movie “In Bruges,” BTW.
“F’in Brugge!” Great movie.
Oh timely, wife and I will be there in July.
Hotel recommendations welcome!
I probably owe Martin something or other smuggled over… hope it is just a beer.
Spend some time in de Garre if you can find it. The house at Tripple is fantastic.
An iconic place
This is a hidden gem off the radar of most
www.cafevlissinghe.be
So many places in Brugge, so little time! Been there about 7 times!
Yep, great book. There should be a new edition (of the Brussels version) coming out this fall. There are some fantastic bars that have opened since the last one, not to mention a few new noteworthy beers.
Also just released is this: Amazon.com
My copy has yet to be broken in, but I also have the previous edition which is well used.
I don’t get to Brugge often, but I always end up at http://www.cambrinus.eu/default.htm
For specifics on Brussels, all of kylekohlmorgen’s suggestions are excellent. He mentioned Bia Mara. Good place, but the parent company has recently opened a bar at Place Flagey called The Black Sheep (Redirecting...). Also great fish-n-chips, better beer selection. The beer list keeps getting stronger. I celebrated my 40th there last week 
I’ll stop myself now, 'cause I could just keep going. Feel free to PM me at anytime.
In Brugge we stayed at the Hotel Cordoeanier and it was nicely affordable. Smallest bathroom in the world.
http://www.cordoeanier.be/en/index.php
Word to the wise if you do stay there the streets are cobblestone. Bring earplugs unless you like the sound of tires on cobblestone. 
You might find some places to visit out of our trip from several years ago. I don’t think Vlissinghe is on the map, but it was a great place.
Can’t thank everyone enough for all the info!
All great suggestions. The only thing I would add is the Half Moon Brewery in Brugge. Awesome beer cheese soup for lunch.
Only had a few days in Brussels/Bruges but I really liked:
- Cantillon
- Moeder Lambic
- Bierbrasserie Cambrinus in Bruges
- Herberg Vlissinghe in Bruges - Not a million beers but had a good selection, very good food and was just a cool atmosphere.
Easy to get between Brussels and Bruges, just a 1 hr train ride. We stayed in Brussels at the Ibis right by Grand Place, close to the Centraal train station and close to pretty much everything. Nothing fancy about the place but was a great location, well run and newer. Felt like the Ikea of hotels.
To do over I’d have stayed in Bruges and visited Brussels or with more time done a few days in Bruges and a day in Brussels. I just liked the feel of Bruges a bit more, easy to get off the beaten path and find some cool stuff. Sure it can be like that in Brussels too but it was a lot more ‘big city’ with most places packed with people.
If you happen to be in photography one of my favorite things on the trip was a photo tour in Bruges. http://www.phototourbrugge.com/ Only 1 guy does the tour and Andy was terrific. Was very fun seeing the ‘off the main path’ stuff with him. He also had tons of great recommendations, like Herberg Vlissinghe, that I’d have certainly have missed. I was there in March which is certainly off peak and on a Monday so it was just me, my wife and him walking around the town.
Depending on your itinerary, you might want to get one of these while you’re here:
http://www.belgianrail.be/en/travel-tickets/passes-cards/rail-pass.aspx
There are lots of cool towns within a few hours of Brussels. Antwerpen, Ghent, Bruges (of course) and Ostend are all worth a visit, time permitting. I think you can skip Liege, the train station is kind of a amazing, but other than that, meh.
We just got back from Brugge and Brussel. We stayed at the Thon in Brussel and the Biskajer in Brugge. Thon was a basic, new hotel, but it had AC and we were on the 25th floor so the view was fantastic. Biskajer had a great breakfast included.
Mort Subite’s beer was disappointing, but the building was really cool. If your time is limited, I’d stay away from Poechenellekelder too. It had a good selection, but the prices were high. It’s right across from the Manneken Pis so most of the people there were buying cokes and didn’t care about beer. Moeder Lambic was awesome. We went to the one on Fontainas. The staff was great and the selection was smaller, but better.
De Kelk in Brugge was awesome as well, with a huge selection and the bartender (owner?) really knew his stuff. There’s a De Struise bottle shop in Brugge as well that’s cool. Also Casa Patata had awesome fries and half chickens. That was really the best food we found. There are lots of places that are really expensive and not very good. Brussel has a lot more options for good food.
I would probably do like 2 days in Brugge and the rest of the time in Brussel. It’s probably not as bad in the fall, but it was like Disney Land in Brugge. I think we saw maybe 5 locals in two days, and they were all at De Kelk.
We went in September 2006 and it was unseasonably warm, but we loved Antwerpen and Brugge and pretty much Brussels was just ok. Ghent was an interesting town, but about a day there was enough.
Based on my experiences at the beginning and end of the trip I’d still pretty much only do Brussels as a place to fly into and out of and to see a few sights. We did get to tour the Royal Palace so that was kinda cool before we headed off to a beer festival. I think we did two nights in Brussels close to a bad part of town (Hotel Albert), two nights in Antwerpen (Hotel Florida), two nights in Brugge (Hotel Cordoeanier), one night in Ghent (Hotel Castel) and one night in Brussels closer to the Grand Place(Hotel Aris).