After 3 nights in Bruges, we hopped on a train to Brussels. Train travel is so easy here! The trains in Belgium are run by SNCB (similar to SNCF in France). You can download the SNCB app and just buy tickets right in the app and then you just show your tickets in the app to the train conductor when they walk through. There are 2 different apps though – one for domestic and one for international. So for a train between Belgium and France you need the international one. There are at least a couple trains an hour between Bruges and Brussels so it was convenient to just get to the station and then buy tickets using the app and hop on the next train.
We stayed at the Warwick Grand-Place Brussels (https://www.warwickhotels.com/warwick-brussels) – another repeat hotel. We stayed here during our visit in 2024 and it’s a very short walk from Brussels-Central train station (Gare de Bruxelles-Central in French; Brussel-Centraal in Dutch). The main station in Brussels (where the Eurostar and other longer-range trains come through) is Brussels-Midi but it was easy to get a domestic train into the Central station.
In my Bruges post I mentioned there are 2 main regions of Belgium (Flanders – the northern part where they speak Flemish/Dutch and Wallonia – the southern part where they speak French). Brussels is physically in the northern part of the country but their official language is both French and Dutch. Despite being in the northern part of the country, I heard French a lot more than Dutch. It is also a very international city (the administrative center for the EU) so it was never a problem speaking English either.
Once we dropped our bags at the hotel, we took the short walk into the main square in Brussels – the Grand Place. It’s always a busy place and it’s a pretty amazing sight to soak in.
A couple of other famous sights in Brussels:
- Manneken Pis (Dutch for Little Pissing Man) – this tiny little statue of a boy peeing gets a lot of attention! The sculpture is only 2 feet tall and was created in 1619 (it has been replaced a few times over the years after being stolen (https://hekint.org/2023/12/21/the-manneken-pis-still-peeing-after-all-these-years/). They have a schedule of festive outfits (he was naked both times we saw him though) and a whole website dedicated to his outfits – https://www.mannekenpis.brussels/en/the-tradition-of-dressing. And near and dear to my heart is this fun fact – they stopped his stream temporarily in June 2025 during World Continence Week to raise awareness for urinary incontinence (https://www.belganewsagency.eu/manneken-pis-temporarily-stops-peeing-to-break-taboo-on-incontinence). There’s also a more modern (1987) female version – Jeanneke Pis statue near the Delirium Cafe (https://www.visit.brussels/en/visitors/venue-details.Jeanneke-Pis.263224). I love that she is squatting to pee – the best anatomic way to relax the pelvic floor!
- Poechenellekelder – this pub right across the street from Manneken Pis has a bunch of bicycles riding up the wall to mark the 2019 Tour de France passing by this spot.
- Delirium Village (https://www.deliriumvillage.com) is an alley with a collection of Delirium bars – the Delirium Café holds the Guinness World Record for the number of beers commercially available (2,004 beers and they secured this record in January 2004). They have several other bars but they are all connected so you and your friends can get draft beers from different bars and share them in any section. We’ve also checked our Delirium Cafés in Strasbourg, France and Lille, France. Turns out they have them all over the world. But Delirium Village is the big one.
- The Carillon du Mont des Arts – its a musical clock with 12 historic figurines and 24 bells. We happened to walk by it (it’s near the Central train station and our hotel) but didn’t hear the bells. You can listen to them here: https://theurgetowander.com/2017/09/01/brussels-carillon/.
- The Royal Museum of the Armed Forces and Military History, also known as the Royal Military Museum, was an amazing museum that we had not previously been to (https://klm-mra.be/en). It sits on the north end of the Parc du Cinquantenaire and was easy to get to by metro from the Central station (14 minutes by metro and about a 45 minute walk if you wanted to do it on foot).
- The Church of St. Catherine is located on Place Sainte-Catherine not far from the Bourse (stock exchange building) in Brussels. The church was built in the 19th century and the square in front of it is a lively place with several restaurants and bars.
- Medieval Walls – there are remnants of old medieval walls around town. The 2 sets we came across when walking around and on a morning run are part of the first set of walls built in the early 13th century (a second set was built in the mid-14th century when Brussels was outgrowing the first set). This is the The Anneessens Tower / Angle Tower that we came across on our run ….
… and this is a section of the earlier set of walls from inside the walls.
- The Cathedral of St. Michael and St. Gudula was built in the 13th century and elevated to cathedral status in 1962. They are celebrating their 800th anniversary this year! (https://cathedralisbruxellensis.be/en/)
- The park in front of the cathedral (Parc de la statue roi Baudouin) had these great lounge chairs and the weather was perfect so we took a break to enjoy the sunshine!
- Overlooking the city is the Congress Column, or Colonne du Congrès, that was constructed between 1850 and 1859 to commemorate the 1830 National Congress that created Belgium’s first constitution. In 1922, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier with an eternal flame was installed at the base of the column in memory of Belgian soldiers who died in WW1.
And of course we had to sample all the Belgian goodies …. cuberdons are a delicious sweet treat that originated in Ghent (https://byfoodandtravel.com/cuberdons-a-colourful-and-tasty-treat-from-ghent/) – we had them on our last trip and they’re nearly impossible to get outside of Belgium. We didn’t make it to Ghent on this trip but they did sell them at La Belgique Gourmande stores in Brussels. Yummy!
Mussels and fries (or moules frites) are a staple as well.
And more frites – with truffle mayo that is so good! Accompanied by Tripel Karmeliet on tap. These were from a place called Frites Atelier (https://www.fritesatelier.com).
Speaking of Triple Karmeliet – we found a place that had happy hour 50 cl Tripel Karmetliet at 2 for €10! (at home a 4-pack of 33 cl/11oz bottles is around $25 so this was a steal!)
Chris was excited to find a place that served their Kwak beer in the right glass (this particular glass was hard to find – while they almost always serve beer in it’s respective glass, this one is popular and I guess they sometimes grow legs ….)
The Beerlab Rooftop (https://thebeerlabrooftop.be/en) is part of the Belgian Beer Museum – you can see the museum or just go up on the rooftop (we did the latter) and enjoy a huge selection of Belgian beers – 150 different beers, 49 on tap – with a great view. It’s on top of the Bourse (Stock Exchange) building and sunset was a perfect time to go.
We discovered a few non-alcoholic versions of classic Belgian beers so had to give a few a try. I did a side-by-side tasting of 5 different beers to compare the original and its NA equivalent. Check out the video to see if any of them measured up.
One last shot of the Grand Place lit up at night.
