Yesterday was a beeeeeeeeeeaauutiful day, perfect for seeing Antwerp. It's a city well-known for fashion, diamonds, and the port canal. Apparently 80% of the world's diamonds pass through Antwerp, where they are cut. Hence, the streets are lined with shops selling all kinds of diamond jewellery.
Its a 45 min train ride across country, interesting for me as I've never been out that way before.Why oh why would anyone call a city 'Antwerp', I hear you ask? Well, according to folklore, the city got its name from the legend of Antigoon. He was a giant who lived near the river Scheldt (runs through Belgium and the Netherlands) and made everyone who crossed the river pay a toll. If anyone refused to pay, he cut off one of their hands and threw it into the river. Apparently he was eventually killed by a young hero called Brabo, who cut off the giant's hand and threw it into the river. So the Dutch name for Antwerp (Antwerpen), is a mix of the name 'Antigoon' and the Dutch word for hand - werpen.
This is a statue of Brabo flinging the Giant's hand into the Scheldt river (in the Grote Markt) or Big Square in the city centre (sorry, you may have to use your imagination 'cause I forgot to take a close-up of the hand...)
Luckily I did get a shot of this one though...Anyways, first call of the day was the oldest bakery in town (122 years), to get Hamish some raisin bread. Best bakery EVER. Taaasty bread pudding!!!
Waiting in line to order his bread. It's the store's specialty - brown bread with raisins ('roggeverdommeke'). You can see the loaves on the shelves to the right. The loaf weighed a ton and was very dense - almost like a giant (and very delicious) scone.
I consider myself privileged to have been able to sample the loaf. Mish is nuts about raisins in any kind of baked good, but especially bread.
This is a photo of one of the courtyards at his house. Basically, he became a really rich dude in the 1600's in Antwerp because he had a crowd of talented artists who helped him finish his works, and he was a clever businessman/architect/painter himself. He had a neat Flemish-style house on one side of this courtyard, connected to an Italian-style painting workshop on the other side. There were a lot of famous Flemish art works created from the 1500 - 1800's, and most of the artists learnt their craft in Italy alongside the likes of Michelangelo and da Vinci. Rubens is somewhat of an icon in Antwerp, and apparently was a bit of a character. When his first wife died of the plague he was deeply saddened, so at 46 he married a 16 year old girl to replace her.
Here's Rubens with the Onze-Lieve-Vrouw Kathedraal (Cathedral of Our Lady).
Another neat thing about Antwerp is the pedestrian tunnel which goes underground from one side of the city to the other, underneath the canal!!
Some stats
Long straight tunnel, interspersed with pedestrians and crazy mental cyclists.
We even found a NZ flag in the Grote Markt, with a whole array of flags on the City Hall building across the square, it seemed to be on its own... weird!
Antwerp has a really different atmosphere to the other Flemish cities I've seen so far, I guess because its a bit more open-spaced and glamourous (some CRAZY fashion goin on in that place).
This was a shopping centre. Just a plain old, gold-detailed shopping centre.... And that UFO thing is a champagne terrace. For drinking champagne. Fancy!!
Waiting in line to order his bread. It's the store's specialty - brown bread with raisins ('roggeverdommeke'). You can see the loaves on the shelves to the right. The loaf weighed a ton and was very dense - almost like a giant (and very delicious) scone.
I consider myself privileged to have been able to sample the loaf. Mish is nuts about raisins in any kind of baked good, but especially bread.So after a bit of a break to enable digestion, we got around to the sight-seeing. We went to visit Rubenshuis (the house and workshop of the famous Flemish painter known as Rubens).
This is a photo of one of the courtyards at his house. Basically, he became a really rich dude in the 1600's in Antwerp because he had a crowd of talented artists who helped him finish his works, and he was a clever businessman/architect/painter himself. He had a neat Flemish-style house on one side of this courtyard, connected to an Italian-style painting workshop on the other side. There were a lot of famous Flemish art works created from the 1500 - 1800's, and most of the artists learnt their craft in Italy alongside the likes of Michelangelo and da Vinci. Rubens is somewhat of an icon in Antwerp, and apparently was a bit of a character. When his first wife died of the plague he was deeply saddened, so at 46 he married a 16 year old girl to replace her.
Here's Rubens with the Onze-Lieve-Vrouw Kathedraal (Cathedral of Our Lady).Another neat thing about Antwerp is the pedestrian tunnel which goes underground from one side of the city to the other, underneath the canal!!
Some stats
Long straight tunnel, interspersed with pedestrians and crazy mental cyclists.
We even found a NZ flag in the Grote Markt, with a whole array of flags on the City Hall building across the square, it seemed to be on its own... weird!Antwerp has a really different atmosphere to the other Flemish cities I've seen so far, I guess because its a bit more open-spaced and glamourous (some CRAZY fashion goin on in that place).
This was a shopping centre. Just a plain old, gold-detailed shopping centre.... And that UFO thing is a champagne terrace. For drinking champagne. Fancy!!We're going to Ypres tomorrow. The 'Flanders Fields'. We're taking our bikes on the train so we can visit all the different NZ memorials.
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