OOps!

I guess I was supposed to make some entries about our trip to Belgium and Holland last month. Sorry. I guess that is what happens when I am busy planning for the arrival of our baby in May and planning an addition and remodel of half our house.

I guess I was also supposed to post updates about rebuilding the wall under our deck that was all rotted out too. I guess I don't really have an excuse about that one except that I still am not quite finished with the project yet. I will save that for after I get info up about our trip even though that is kind of in reverse order.

Melissa and Dan's trip to Belgium and Holland, Jan 28 - Feb 4, 2009

I promise that I will try to keep these post "light" on all things bicycles, but will try to put some bicycle "heavy" posts up at the teamWLB Blog.

Day -1 and 1

The air flights (from Hartford to Washington Dulles to Brussels) were very uneventful. Melissa got in a few hour long naps and got up and moved around on a regular basis as instructed by the OB. Dan took some Tylenol PM's to try to get some sleep. The first two didn't do to much. The second two brought a period of an hour or so of feelings of borderline claustrophobia and needing to do jumping-jacks at the back of the plane. After another hour of repeatedly feeling like I was going to fall asleep only to jerk myself wake, I finally dozed off for I think an hour. By that time we only had an hour left in the flight and were starting our descent.

Once our plane landed we were quickly (no checked baggage to pick up) aboard the train to Brussels. After finding the lockers to stash our bags for the day we headed out to stroll the streets of Brussels. We soon found the Grote Markt. We then met up with our friend Doug at the Manneken-Pis. Doug is from Easthampton and was here for Cyclocross World Championships too, and had been over to Berlin a few days earlier to watch part of the 6 day track race there. After lunch we napped at the hotel for a few hours and then met up with Doug again at night. After dinner we walked around some more taking in the beauty of the buildings and the city at night.

We didn't do a whole lot that first day as we were both rather wiped from the traveling and the time change. It was great to do a bit of strolling around the city, get a feeling of what the city was like and to get our bearings. It is relatively easy city of navigate and has a extensive public transit system, not to mention all the people that were traveling by bicycle. It was a great first day to the trip and we wanted to make sure not to over do it so that we would have plenty of energy for the rest of the trip. Here are some more photos from Day 1 of the trip, including a map of where the photos were taken. Day 2 to come soon.