Europe – “Riding the Rails” – Ghent, Belgium (3)

Riding the rails created a little intrigue as we left Lens. The departures board at the train station was out of service, so, confirming our train time and platform took some questioning of the locals (en francais, which adds to the intrigue). We would not have found the correct platform without their help. We again switched trains in Lille, but fortunately not stations this time. Arriving in Ghent, we found a taxi with a great driver who took us to our hotel, 1898 The Post.

1898 The Post is a wonderful hotel! It is at the edge of the old town area and yet still in the heart of the area with easy access to the sights and transportation. As the name implies, the building was once a post office, and, the hotel now occupies the upper floors of Ghent’s old post office building. There are only 38 rooms in the hotel, but, they are great rooms with all the modern conveniences. Our room was spacious, very well appointed, and, we had a great view of one of the many picturesque streets. One of the issues with having a great room in a great hotel is not wanting to leave it, but, we tore ourselves away to explore the town.

With only two days, the best one can hope for is to get a sense of the city. We walked the streets, and, I kept taking pictures as everything was camera worthy, which is not surprising as Ghent is one of Belgium’s oldest cities and the historic capital of Flanders. Ghent was powerful and well organized with its wealthy trade guilds. It was a great cloth city that was medieval Europe’s third largest city. These days Ghent has Belgium’s largest student population with over 70,000 students.

During the first afternoon and much of the next day, we just explored the streets, stared in wonder at the churches, castle and buildings and stopped in at a local flea market (and I admit to just a bit of shopping as I saw a necklace and bracelet that I could not resist). Perhaps the most unusual street was Graffiti Street. It was an entire block with the sides of the buildings covered in graffiti. It was graffiti, but, there was real talent evident in the painting.

Both evenings we had dinner in outside restaurants. The first evening the rain came late enough, and, the umbrella coverage was good enough that we finished our meal outside. The second evening we started outside, but, the wind and intermittent rain proved too much for us, and, we moved inside.

Following dinner our last evening, I wanted to do the “Light Walk,” which consists of the city’s buildings and squares being lit up at night. Steve, being the wiser of us, decided that he did not want to go walking in the rain in the dark to see Ghent’s beautiful buildings lit up. So, I grabbed an umbrella and walked, and, it was worth it. Eventually the rain won out, and, I went back to our nice cozy warm room.