Trip to Oostende - the beach!

Today was a clear sunny day (although only 5 degrees, and very cold in the wind), so three of us decided to catch the train to the coastal town of Belgium - Oostende. Or Ostend in English. All the cities in Belgium have names in Dutch, French and English so it can be hard to keep up! Oostende is about 40 min by train from Gent, passing through the city of Brugge which we went to last weekend. I really wanted to see the coast, the sea, and also to check if we could maybe see the UK from Belgium! But alas no, you cannot. But we could see the coastline of France heading toward the UK so that was neat. I made a point of dipping my hand in the water (the North Sea) which was freeeeezing, but worth it so now I can say I have been in the North Sea. Nice. I only took one small shell from the beach (aren't I good!), to keep in my room.

The photos above are of me at the seaside (lots of little mussels), and me at the train station with 'my friends' who were some random statues. You can see from the different colours across the laps of the statues that lots of people have been sitting on them!

We unfortunately didn't learn much about the history of the town as we had no guides and no maps of the city except for the ones we found on bus stops and the like. But we did manage to find the city park and the big cathedrals (about 85% of Belgians are Catholic) and had a good look around the port and the channels. I know that around 10% of Belgium is reclaimed land so it must be in the Oostende area.

Me, Orestis and Andre have really enjoyed both the trips to Brugge and Oostende, so have made a pact to travel somewhere new every weekend. I am glad I invested in a train pass which gives me pretty much a 50% discount on the tickets, because I knew I would want to see all the main cities in Belgium. When we are brave enough, we will go to some of the French-speaking towns, and then to Paris! Sounds glamourous I know, but apparently it is difficult to get by on English alone. Maybe we will have to recruit some French-speaking students as guides!