Antwerpen AutoVrij Weekend

We have spent the past week or so getting our bikes set up with kid seats and having minor repairs worked on. I now have 2 child seats on my bike - 1 on the front and 1 on the back - and have been riding Colin to and from school everyday.

Friday, Craig was waiting for me in the garage when I walked my bike in after school with a flat tire. We were looking at it trying to figure out what to do when 2 middle aged men asked us if we needed help. They are both from the Netherlands but the one gentleman had his weekend home in the building next to ours. They were on their way out, but promised to call when they got back to help.

My phone rang around 6pm and when I answered it, I was told it was the Bike Repair Team calling. Craig met up with them and they patched my tire. My friend put it perfectly when he said that if you have a bike emergency, you couldn't ask for any better than to have someone Dutch come to your rescue.

Saturday, many of the main shopping streets were closed to cars. We were riding near the art museum when who did we run into, but our Bike Repair Team. Paul noticed that one of Craig's tires looked low and pulled out a full sized bike pump from his bag. We thought it was so funny.

Sunday Antwerp was auto free. It was great. We are continually amazed at the events and activites Antwerp has. There were different activities all over the city and the majority of the people were riding their bikes to get around. In 2 locations, they laid sod down on the cement and created a small oasis with chairs, hammocks and toy lawn mowers for the kids. One area had a small petting zoo. We met up with our friend Robert who is here finishing his PhD in Art History. His wife and son went back to the US in August, so he spent the day with us.

Sunday was also a day when the city allows the residents to sell things in front of their homes. We picked up so many things including a bike trailer for the kids to ride in.

I am still surprised by some of the things I see on bikes or how they are rigged up. Yesterday we saw a bike that was parked with a bird in a birdcage strapped to the back. The bike next to it had a box with live chickens on the back. Saturday I saw a woman riding her bike with an infant in a sling around her chest. To top it off, the infant was nursing at the time.

It was an awesome weekend and hopefully our Dutch Bike Repair Team will find us again in a time of need.

First Day of School

Wednesday was Colin's first day at his new school. We put him in Da Vinci International School. All classe are taught in English. Many of the staff and teachers are from the UK because it follows a British curriculum. Colin is enrolled in the pre-school and does not have to wear a uniform, but the rest of the school, K-12, does. We did have to buy and outfit for him to wear to PE on Thursday - I will post a picture when I have one.

Yesterday, Colin's teacher spoke to me about an problem she had with Colin not listening. She told be that he burped during snack time and would not say excuse me. Something tells me that is not the last conversation we will be having like that.

London

We took the train to London on Saturday. The Eurostar leaves Brussels and arrives in London in 1 hour and 51 minutes. But Colin still says he can run faster than the train because he has been drinking a lot of milk.

Right away, it was obvious how many tourists were in London. Just navigating down the street was difficult.While walking across the Westminster Bridge, Colin sneezed right into a vendors bowl of roasted peanuts. We pretended we didn't see and kept walking - fast! The London Eye, the ferris wheel, was our first stop. It gave us a great view of the city and Big Ben. When we were in line, a little kid called Chloe "Whitey", I knew it wasn't a racist thing, but that he was just referring to her hair. It was still funny.We wandered around a bit and ended up in Piccadilly Circle for dinner.

We saw the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. Colin and Chloe were digging holes in the grass outside and we told Colin that the Queen was going to be mad and send her guards after him.Monday Afternoon, we went over to the Natural History Museum. Colin loved the dinosaurs and ran through the rest of the museum pointing and yelling out the names of the animals - not much different than being at the zoo. Chloe liked it too. She is now shreking everytime she sees something. It is really pleasant.

We ended up back in the Piccadilly Circle area everynight for a good dinner - thank you Rick Steves.

We took in most of the big sites, Tower Bridge, Tower of London, Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace, but we always came back to Parliament and Big Ben. It was so beautiful and something we are glad we saw in person. We arrived back in Antwerp on Tuesday allowing us just over 24hrs to pack to come home - we will be back in Haddonfield on Thursday for 2 weeks.

Summer in the City

We have been seeing a lot of the interesting activities in Antwerp during the past week or so. Antwerpen means hand throwing and it was named after a folklore that tells of a man who cuts off the hand of a giant, who was tormenting the city, and throws it into the river. This past weekend there was a hand throwing contest in Grote Markt. Fortunately when we went down there we did not see any hands being thrown, but who knows what happened after we left.

Last Wednesday, all of the streets were blocked off around us for a motor paced race. I had to google it to find out what it was called. It was a team sport with a cyclist following a motorized bicycle. I would guess that they must have been traveling over 30 miles per hour. It was really bizarre and seemed dangerous, but it drew a large crowd and they were obviously very passionate about it.

We live in the best spot to catch all of the events. There are also mobile bars that often drive down our street. They are rented by a group of people who help move the bar by pedaling while sitting at their bar stools. It is hysterical.

We also bought Colin a big bike this past weekend. I actually cried when he got on it and started riding around - he is so big!! He is doing so well riding it, I feel bad we waited this long to get him one.

We will be heading to London on Saturday for a long weekend. It is going to be a challange to pack light since we are taking the train!

Ladybug Beach

Saturday we drove over to the Belgian seaside. There are several coastal towns where people vacation along the North Sea. The towns we drove through were crowded but not like the Jersey shore. We found a stretch of beach between towns and made it our spot for the day.

Walking through the dunes, we noticed that there were ladybugs flying all around us. The ladybugs ended up being all over the beach. We had so much fun and we practically had the beach to ourselves. I am surprised we didn't bring any home with us.

Park Spoor Noord

Today, we headed out to the new water park in the northern section of town. It has 2 very shallow splash pools and a great sand playground. It is free and just opened this past June.

The area around the splash pools was set up with fabric sling chairs and large lounging pillows. There were cool tables for picnicing or for the restuarant. There was a bar and a DJ playing music! It was great!

Normandy

I think the kids will formally protest if we try to put them in the car again anytime soon.

We drove just about 1000 miles over 3 days when we went to Normandy, France. The car ride there took about 8 hours with holiday traffic. We had done our homework before we left by watching The Longest Day and were ready to see it all.

We stayed in Bayeux and shortly after arriving, we went to see the Bayeux Tapestry. It was really amazing to see and hear the story behind each panel. Unfortunutley, they did not allow us to take pictures. We had dinner in town and crashed for the night.

Sunday morning, we headed out to Omaha Beach. The beach is marked with 2 memorials. It does not need much else, it is really moving just to be there knowing that 3500 Americans lost their lives there.

Afterwards, we drove up the hill to the American Military Cemetary. It is in a beautiful location overlooking the beach.

In the afternoon, we went to Mont St Michel. It almost looked like a mirage as we were approaching. The first building on the island was a church almost 1300 years ago. Over time, the church was expanded and houses and businesses were built. During low tide, you can walk all of the way around it. A causeway was built in 1879. We thought it was funny that while in the parking lot, our GPS showed that we were in the middle of the water.

Monday we set off to see more D-Day sites. Our first stop was Arromanches where there are over 140 cement caissons that form a semi circle in the water to form a harbor to offload equipment.

We then went to Longues-Sur-Mer to see the German cement bunkers along the coast. Our next stop was Point du Hoc. We were anxious to see the cliffs the rangers scaled but were most surprised by the enorous craters and destroyed military bunkers still there from the bombings.

We should have gotten on the road, but wanted to go to St Mere Eglise because it was so prominantly featured in The Longest Day. We were surprise that they had a dummy soldier hanging from his parachute from the side of the church. It was kind of weird but it gave you a good sense of what it was actually like.

It was a great trip and a long drive, but very interesting. The coast along the English Channel is beautiful and the water is much prettier and bluer than I expected. The towns we traveled through were very old and quiet.

I posted a lot of pictures to Flickr.