Europe 2012- Day 58: Brussels, Belgium

Sunday morning we got up early, not on purpose really but we didn’t realize that the time was changing so we had eaten breakfast before we realized that we didn’t miss count the church chimes, and our computers didn’t just get a mind of their own and change the time.

As I was getting ready Nate started watching the Formula 1 race, by the time I was ready to go there weren’t many laps to go we ended up eating lunch and watching the finish before we rushed out the door.

We were heading to a place called Mini Europe down in Brussels. Mini Europe, like the Madurodam we visited in Holland, has scale models of buildings and monuments. Brussels is the capitol of the European Union so the first building is the capitol building of the European Union that is also located in Brussels.

European Union Capitol Building

An overview picture of the park from the entrance

The house near Paris where the Robert Schuman declaration was written, which was the birth of the European Union.

The first country we came to was Denmark. Denmark is made up of 406 islands, 97 which are inhabited. Another interesting thing is that 70% of women work in Denmark, that is the highest percentage in the EU.

Nate the Viking

Trelleborg is a reconstructed Viking village with 31 wooden “long-houses”.

Copenhagen is also represented with Nyhavn (New harbor) which with all the bright colored buildings gets much of its character from the Dutch people. 

Sweden is represented by the Stockholm City Hall building. Construction started in 1911 after 12 years it was finally ready to use. One interesting thing about the building is that the people were given an opportunity to sponsor the roof of the building. Each roof tile was numbered, and for 25 crowns they could buy one of the roof tiles, then the numbers and names were recorded in the copper book. Their King at the time, King Gustaf V bought the first tile and even nailed it to the roof himself.

Stockholm City Hall

Some interesting people come from Sweden. A man by the name of Nobel who invented dynamite, he left his fortune to create the The Nobel Prize. Sweden also gave us the much loved children’s character Pippi Longstocking.

Olavinlinna Castle,  Finland

Finland came next being represented by the Olavinlinna Castle. Built in 1475 it used to be part of the frontier defenses against Russia. Some fun facts about Finland: known as “the land of the thousand lakes” there is actually 187,888 lakes. There are more saunas than there are cars in Finland (1.6 million.) The Finish language in Finland is called Suomi, and Swedish is also one of its official languages.

Tallinn

Estonia was represented by Tallinn, this large seaport and cannon tower known as fat Margareta was rebuilt in 1529. In Estonia nearly 70% of people live in cities. They were an independent state between 1918 – 1940 but then they didn’t regain their freedom until 1991.

Monument of Freedom in Riga

Latvia’s Monument of Freedom in Riga. The Monument depicts the female symbol of Liberty, at her feet are different sculptures that represent values such as, labor, family, strength or the nation, and strength of spirituality and historical events.

Facts: 1/3 of the population lives in the capitol of Riga. The famous route “from the Vikings to the Greeks” went through present-day Latvia.

University of Vilnius, Lithuania

Lithuania has the University of Vilnius. Founded by the Jesuits in 1579 in the center of Old Town near the Bishops palace.

Facts: Lithuania is one of the world’s leading producers of linen. Basketball is Lithuania’s national sport, and they were even the European champions in 2003.

We finally came to The Netherlands, and I was pleased to see that some of the buildings I haven’t been to yet.

Facts: more than half of the area of the Netherlands lies below sea level. 65% of Dutch people go on holiday at least once a year, and are the Europeans most likely to go on a trip during their free time. They have the second highest population density in Europe with 480 people per km squared. They sell 12 billion flowers every year (50% exported), and they have over 19,000 km of cycle paths with 80% of the population owning a bicycle.

Maastrict, the oldest southern town in Holland.

The Hoensbroek Castle located near Maastricht.

Middelburg, the capitol of the Zeeland province in Holland.

Alkmaar, Holland

 Belgium followed, starting with the Curtius House, built between 1600-1610 in Liege. Belgium is also the birthplace of french fries, called so because of the cut of the potato, and has nothing to do with France. Half of their energy comes from nuclear power and  70% of the worlds diamond cutting industry is located in Antwerp, Belgium.

The Curtius House, Liege, Belgium

The Grand Palace in Brussels where every 2 years in August they make what is called the floral carpet in the square out in front. This model of the Grand Palace cost around 350,000 euros and took 19,000 hours to make.

Antwerp town hall.

Leuven, Belgium. This town hall was built in the mid 15th century. It's covered in 236 figures.

The Bell Tower in Brugge. For pictures of the real thing you can look several blogs back to our visit to Brugge.

This is just an example of an off-shore oil rig. It's a 1/25 scale.

 The United Kingdom came into view next. The first passenger railway in the world was built in England between Manchester and Liverpool.

I've joined the ranks!

The parliament building with Big Ben in London. Big Ben is actually the name of the bell in the tower, named after the building contractor, Mr. Bejamin Hall. It was said you could eventually get around him, but only after a long walk.

 Ireland was rightfully next to the UK. Being represented by the Rock of Cashel or St. Patrick's Rock. It's the oldest remnant of Irish Christianity, being the location where in 450 St. Patrick converted the King of Munster by explaining the Holy Trinity to him using a 3 leafed shamrock clover.

The Rock of Cashel on the left.

 81% of Ireland is agricultural land and 86% of Irish people consider themselves to be religious, and attend at least 1 church service per week.

Bath, located in the UK. The hot water springs were first discovered around 800 B.C. by Blalud, the son of a King who had been cast out due to some kind of disease to tend to diseased pigs. During his rounds he happened upon the springs, his pigs that were sick were healed after spending some time in the water, so he went into the water and was also cured, and allowed to return to court.

The jumbo ferry that goes from Calais, France to Dover, England on a 27 day crossing. It can carry 2290 passengers.

 France was not surprisingly represented by Paris, the Eiffel Tower, and Arc de Triomphe as well as the Sacre-coeur. The french are known as the least industrious people in Europe with only 1568 hours per year, which is only about 30 hours per week.

Eiffel Tower

The Sacre-Coeur Basilica. Built out of Chateau-Landon stone, which turns lighter and harder as it's exposed to the air.

In the back you can see the Atomium which was constructed in 1958 for the worlds fair in Brussels.

The model of this 16th century Castle of Chenonceaux in France took more than 2 years to build and is made from French stone.

 Portugal, founded in 1143 is the European country with the oldest border. Portugal has the highest average temperatures in Europe (16 degrees celcius) as well as the highest average hours of sunshine per year. Portuguese is one of the five most spoken languages in the world.

Porto, Portugal

Guimaraes Castle is where the first King of Portugal was born

 Spain oddly enough has a national holiday on October 12 to celebrate Christopher Columbus's discovery of America. Christopher was commissioned by the Queen of Spain and so the discovery belongs to them.

These white windmills were the setting for the story of Don Quixote.

El Escorial is located 30 miles from Madrid in the mountains. The royal monastery was built to commemorate the defeat of the French troops in 1557. This building contains 26 tombs of kings and queens, 7,500 relics and 35,000 books. The building also has 2,600 windows, 1,200 doors, 15 cloisters(similar to a courtyard), and 86 staircases.

Seville is home to the Plaza de Toros where bullfights are held regularly from late spring to early fall.

The Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela

Barcelona has a monument in memory of Christopher Columbus.

 Malta may be a small country but it has the highest density of churches (400 in total) and is also home to the megalithic temples that date from about 3200 B.C.

The temple of Mnajdra was created 3,400 before Jesus Christ, and 800 years before the great pyramids and Stonehenge.

 Italy is the European country with the most rainfall anally with 95 cm (34.5"). Italians also have the longest life expectancy of Europeans with 85.3 years for women and 80.4 years for men.

The Campanile, 55 meters in height, which is known as "The Leaning Tower" has never been straight since its construction. Constructed started in 1173, when the first 2 levels were built everything was fine, but with the addition of the 3rd level the tower started to lean due to being built on marshy ground. After the tower started to lean construction was stopped for 100 years as engineers hoped that the ground would settle and harden. When construction started again they tried to correct the lean with the additional 4 levels but that just made a banana effect and made it worse. In recent years the tower has been stabilized.

Nate holding up the leaning tower of Pisa

Piazza del Campo in Siena, Italy. When the building was built between 1287-1355 the architect had to swear a solemn oath that the building wouldn't fall down in 2000 years. (Maybe due to the fact that the tower in Pisa was leaning)

I thought this was funny. This Italian village called Alberobello is known for it's simple houses with conical roofs and whitewashed walls. In the event of a tax inspection, these houses could be quickly demolished and rebuilt afterwards. In this way, the inhabitants could avoid the heavy taxes which were charged for the building of a new town.

Their Venice model had people on gondola rides, but they looked a bit flooded.

Germany: The most likely European people to visit a doctor, going on average 11 times a year. They are the biggest consumers of bread in Europe, and Germany is home to the largest clock in Europe, which is in the Cologne Cathedral.

Lubeck: This town gate was once featured on the 50 Mark note

Berlin

An actual piece of the Berlin Wall

Magdeburg has the Millennium Tower which at 60 meters high is the highest laminated wood tower in the world.

Luxembourg, represented by the Pont Adolphe which was built at the beginning of the 20th century.

Gdansk, Poland

Prague, Czech Republic: The astronomical clock on the Old Town Hall indicates local time, Sumerian time, Italian Hours, the astronomical position of the earth and planets and the calendar. The clock was built in 1410 with the calendar being added in 1490.

Bratislava, Slovakia.

Mogosoaia, Romania. Dracula, a character created by B. Stocker, was inspired by Vlad the Impaler, the son of Vlad Dracul from Romania.

Budapest, Hungary.  The Romans' motto was "In Balneis Salus," meaning baths are the source of health. There are more than 400 balneotherapy centers in Hungary

Ljubjana, Slovenia. This triple bridge spans the Ljubljanica river. The main bridge was built in 1820 to replace a wooden bridge, the two additional bridges were added in 1920. After an earthquake in 1895 Austria paid to rebuild the bridge, which it thought had been destroyed. It had not been destroyed though, and they used the money to enlarge the bridge instead of just giving back the money.

Melk, Austria. 98% of Austrians speak German, and 90% are Roman Catholic. Winter sports are enjoyed year round here. The city of Melk was the first capitol of Austria and is most known for the 18th century abbey.

Athens, Greece. In Greece, only men over the age of 18, and interested in the Orthodox religion may set foot on Mount Athos, women are strictly forbidden. These regulations are even specifically enshrined in the European Union treaty.

The Kourion Theatre in Limassol, Cyprus.

 Most of the information above was taken from the guide book given when you enter the park.

When we left the park it was about time for dinner, so we decided to drive into Brussels city center to find some food. Figuring out how to get into a parking garage was a little bit of a challenge, we ended up going in a few circles before we were finally able to park.

Parliament building for Belgium

 Upon walking up to the street we found a small open market going on and several small restaurants, but most of them looked more like fast food so we kept going.

The Grand Palace of Brussels which had a tourist office in it. We were able to get a map of the city so we could find our way around better.

Belgian waffles are really good, and you can find them all over for sale.

We were surprised to see this small statue of what is known as Manneken Pis after seeing the large chocolate one in the window. The original statue was put here in 1619, but due to frequently being stolen the original is kept in the palace and this is a replica. There are many legends as to how the statue came to be but most of them revolve around a little boy peeing on something and helping to save the town from attackers somehow.

During different times of the year the statue is dressed in costumes

Chocolate, banana, and whipped cream on a Belgian Waffle

Yes please ... complete with a gummy Mannekin Pis

Saw this statue while wandering around the city.

This was a cool looking cathedral. I'm surprised any of my pictures turned out as we were just driving by.

 After walking around awhile we finally settled on a place to eat. Luckily dinner didn't take very long as we wanted to get on our way home.  I had originally not been interested in going to Brussels, but after going there I think we could even go back and have lots of things to check out.

So with our stomachs full of good food and Belgian Waffles we happily concluded our weekend.