We went to Brussels on the spur of the moment.  Since neither of us had been there, and it is the capital of the world of chocolate, what better place for a diversion while we wend our way to The Netherlands?

We took a TGV (really fast French train) to Brussels' Midi station.  We then needed to find a hotel, which wasn't a problem at all.  It was a lot nicer than the hotel in Paris, for a little less money even.

The neighborhood around the hotel had all the charms of Lagos, or maybe more appropriately, The Ivory Coast, a previous colony.  It was really run down, really desolate, and totally lacking in working ATM machines.  All of which can be troublesome when you are hungry, want to get out of this part of town, and don't have any local cash.  The Euro will be a welcome addition as far as we're concerned.

We eventually got to the Grand Place which looked a lot more like the way I had pictured Brussels.  

These pictures are taken of the various sides of the Grand Place.  it has such impact, it is so visually rich, that the pictures hardly do it any justice.

The first picture of the Hotel d' Ville, but it has cafes located in some of the arches.  The second picture of the tower at the top of the hotel.

The third picture is part of the local government palaces.  And again, there are stores and cafes in the arches at the street level.  It did seem a little incongruous to have this terrific old architecture with the gold leaf, and then have a neon sign for a brand of beer at the base.

The fourth picture shows the most diverse side the Place, but also shows the most varied stone work on the facades.

We continued our walk around Brussels, and felt we had to visit the Mannikin Pis, or in English, the little statue of small bay pissing.  Apparently he's a local celebrity of sorts. He has his own museum and literally hundreds of outfits, like the ones shown here.  

He is supposed to be a status of a boy that somehow saved the town by pissing on a fire, or something like that.  Caroline thought it would be great to get another picture of something "different" poking out the top of her head.  Go figure..

Caroline is one of the best navigators I've ever had the pleasure to accompany.  She can find her way around any place that we've ever been.  She's great in the car and on foot.  But Brussels was her Waterloo, so to speak.  Neither of us could figure out how to navigate this town.  The Metro, Tram, and street maps never agreed, or even seemed to look similar.  We finally figured out where the Place Sainte-Gudule church is, and were able to figure out where we were by referencing it's towers.  Otherwise, Brussels is still a major mystery at the street level.  We ended up using taxis quite a bit just to avoid all the walking around in circles.

Caroline and I found the fish restaurants near the St. Catharine church.  We decided it was time for a good lobster dinner.  The dinner was great, and we were early so there weren't any smokers fouling the place, a great piece of luck.  But nothing good goes unpunished, and Caroline was tortured by the lobsters hasty exit over the next day and a half.  Somehow I escaped that experience.

The next day we went back to the Grand Place because we spied something near and dear to our hearts.

Brussels is the heart of the worlds fine chocolate business.  Since Caroline and I are severe chocoholics, this might be considered ground zero for our favorite vice.  And then we spotted the Chocolate museum at the Grand Place.  And we zipped inside.  

The chocolate museum is a pretty serious disappointment.  It's basically a small exhibit sponsored by Barry Callabaut, which is the largest chocolate maker in Belgium, and the supplier to all the confectioners like Godiva and the rest. 

It seems like somehow Belgium figured out how to make the colonies of west Africa useful since chocolate only grows at the equator.  And to this day seems like one of the major cash crops in that part of the world.

We proceeded onwards from the chocolate museum to a covered mall.  In a place like Belgium, where the weather is generally wet, you have to cover the mall areas or it would tough to get people to shop.  The cool part is the detail and architectural designs that adorn the space.  This hall is typical of many that we saw.

We walked along the Rue Royale and saw the royal palace of Belgium.  This palace is HUGE.  It's larger than this picture represents just because I couldn't get all of it into the frame.  I was frequently struck by how large many of the old buildings are.  It's a completely different scale than you might see in Paris or Rome.

We finally found the chocolatier Mary on the Rue Royale.  It lived up to it's reputation as a great place to find hand made chocolate of exquisite quality.  We did end up getting a few things..

The chocolate shop is found at this landmark.  It's the Brussels version of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.  It has a permanent flame burning and it's really tall. 

Caroline thought this advertisement was worth a picture.  No accounting for taste..  :-)