"BRUGES" a Brugge Travel Page by Acirfa

Bruges is the capital and largest city of the province of West Flanders in the Flemish Region of Belgium.

The historic city centre is a prominent World Heritage Site of UNESCO. It is egg-shaped and about 430 hectares in size.

Along with a few other canal-based northern cities, it is sometimes referred to as "The Venice of the North".
Bruges has a significant economic importance thanks to its port, and is also home to the College of Europe.

We had but a few hours in Bruges, having taken a coach trip over on the Chunnel. Amazing how easy it is to travel from England, through France and into this lovely historic town. It is much larger than I had imagined and busy, busy, busy!

The main street was not a pull for me, as it is just a centre like any other popular town anywhere in Europe or the Western World, it has every shop and designer store you can imagine. However, for me it was the side streets, the beautiful 'Dutch' style buildings, the ambience of the place felt very much as if I had stepped back into Christmases gone by and it was not even Christmas fare time. The quaint and elegant shops filled with decorations for the coming festivities were wondrous, Christmas trees that snowed, delights that take one back to a magical time during childhood.

I would have liked to have had more time to explore during a quieter time perhaps, time to learn a little more about the town and absorb it's historic presence that is so much part of a visit to this area.