Back to Belgium

We woke up on Saturday to a lot of noise and people on the street outside our hotel room, so I took Tut out that morning to check things out and found that a huge weekend market was being set up. We are no strangers to the markets as most cities have regular ones, but this one simply blew me away. It not only covered the huge t'Zand, but went down the street next to our hotel and connected to yet another square. It was huge! And it wasn't a run-of-the-mill farmer's market either...it had everything you could imagine.
People had mic-packs on giving demonstrations about what they were selling, and allowing to people to try their product out before purchasing...like this guy.



The eggs in the farmer's market area came straight from the chickens themselves....I mean talk about fresh! And these same chickens an other small livestock were for sale as well. (As you can imagine Tut was going nuts).

Then in another part of the market were mobile shops. Some of these included fresh cheeses, salads, and meats...and others were filled with prepared food like roasted chickens, pasteries, and wurst. And people wanted everything...it was packed! All of these people were waiting for fresh roasted chicken.

Clothing was another big item with vendors taking up half the market. And then there was my favorite...a kiosk devoted to tuning up bicycles, and the line was outrageous!
Clearly the dog was far to stimulated and a little crazy so we took him back and started our day wandering the city when we came upon yet another market along one of the canals. This one reminded me more of a flea market as people were selling things made or being resold...kind of like a really good garage sale.

We weren't sure how long it went on for, but at 4:30 as we made our way back to our hotel and our dog it appeared as though nothing had happened at all. The streets and the squares were completely empty and cleaned with out a scrap of what had happened earlier that day. That is certainly something I loved about Brugge (and Germany as well)...it is so clean! Another great day, and more to come!

Auf Wiedersehen!