It’s my husband K’s birthday! And, he is playing in a quintet this morning. So, what happens, but my alarm is set wrong. Luckily, his was not and he was up on time. I skipped my stretches, so that I could be ready in one half hour and off to breakfast with him at 7:35.
It was your typical European breakfast buffet, with a few additions. This one had pre-cooked sunny-side up eggs and hard boiled and medium boiled eggs, what ever the latter is. The rolls for my traditional breakfast sandwich were large and the one I chose was soft. The fruit was all freshly cut up, from what I could tell. Good breakfast.
When we left at 8:15, it was sunny and warm. He did not walk slowly and I had to work to keep up, because my knees were not liking it. In 15 minutes, we were at the Kinepolis, which, as I guessed, was a movie theater.
Already there was a change. Instead of using theaters 1-3, they were using 3-5. We found that 5, at least, found you walking in with the screen to your right and all the seats to the left. So, there was no way for someone to sneak in late. Also, there were no chairs or music stands for the musicians. While I went off to find the ladies room, they rectified the situation.
When I got back, I sat in the middle of the second row, and when he was warmed up, my husband joined me to watch the other two performances. The saxophone professor from my husband’s university slipped into the seat on my other side. He would be playing with my husband tomorrow and rehearsing with him after this performance.
The performance went very well and the audience, while not large, was still receptive. I took photos of the group afterwards and mentioned the birthday, since the person whom I had contacted about it a couple of days ago did not bring it up. He told me later, that lots of people at the ClarinetFest had wished him well during the day, because they saw it on Facebook.
At 10:15, the three of us left and reached the hotel lobby about 15 minutes later. On the way, we passed the hippodrome, where there had been a World Cup viewing on a giant screen. The sax player and his wife had gone and he said it was quite something to be there, when Belgium won. My
husband went upstairs for his lanyard and then he and the sax player headed off for the conservatory.
I went up and did a fruitless internet search for church info. Finally, at 11:25, I headed off for the tourist information service near the casino. It was a touch hazy with a cool breeze along the streets. I took photos of things that interested me, such as this statue of one of the King Leopolds.
It took only 15 minutes to reach my destination. Inside, I quickly figured out how to get a ticket to get info in English. The young woman did a search on her computer and then marked the times at the church I knew about, plus two more! Those two were having Mass this evening. I decided to locate them, when I left at 11:44.
The first up was the Capucienenkirk only 8 minutes away. Unfortunately, it was closed until tonight’s 5:30 Mass.
I headed south, wandering around all 4 sides of the market, noting the variety of vegetables, meat and even spices. At this late hour, the baked goods truck was almost sold out. I resisted the temptation to buy anything.
I reached St. Peter and St. Paul, a large Neo-Gothic church, at 12:10. It, too, was closed, but seeing the sign brought home the fact that they have Mass on Sunday night at 5. If I went to that one, I could do his birthday dinner when he wanted tonight and go to his recital in the morning. That settled, I roamed around the church taking photos of flying buttresses, gargoyles, etc. There was a memorial that had the names of the King and Queen from WWI, as well as interesting sculpted figures on the back. I even took pictures of the church tower ruin behind it.
At 12:30 I moved on. I found myself walking along the waterfront. Across the way, I could see the train station, where we'd arrived yesterday.
I had chosen a place for lunch, when I was back at the hotel. When I finally found it, however, there was no table available for me, she said, even though I saw an empty one. I thought, I might have better luck up on the promenade. So, I continued up the street next to the inlet. I stayed on the city side to avoid the fish stands on the other side.
As the street bent, the promenade began. There was a big beach festival up there, but it cost 60 Euros for the day. Ouch. I saw kids playing in a water fountain that is all those fountains that shoot up from the ground. I continued on to the seamen’s monument. It is so tall, it is probably visible from the sea. Past that, I saw giant orange sculptures, that looked like crumpled plastic.
Beyond that on the beach, I saw two huge sand castles. I recognized them as Disney and was taking a picture of the corporate sign and the sign saying “Disney Sand Magic”, when I decided to walk next to the fence to see what was up. The view was blocked by banners. I came to a kiosk and saw that it would cost me 12 Euros.
That didn’t seem too bad, so I paid, got my ticket and brochure and went in. There were so many more sculptures, the others being from big blocks of sand. There was music, mostly Disney and I found I still know the words to
Colors of the Wind. There were the slung beach chairs in front of many and giant princess chairs in front of a couple, all for taking selfies. There were a couple of bounce houses and trampolines. A very long tent contained sofas. A glass pavilion had a bar, where
I bought a Coke Zero can for 2 Euros and sat in a rattan chair, watching another block of sand being uncased. There were characters and scenes for Star Wars, Marvel, Pixar and Disney productions. There were over 80 and they were amazing. It was well worth the 12 Euros. I saw them all in 40 minutes, but went back through them again and discovered a couple I’d missed on a dead end at the beginning.Tangled was called Rapunzel or they could have been referring to her. But Moana was the only one who definitely got called something else. I took pictures of every single one, but I will put only a sampling here.
When I left at 2:20, it seemed to late for lunch. I took photos along the promenade and of the beach. I saw a large crowd of black people all bunched together near the water and then I saw these guys in the water. It was probably their white outfits, but it seemed to be a baptism to me.
I saw a couple of these places on the beach that seemed to be bars. I couldn't decide how public they are.
I was pleasantly surprised to see this poster for ClarinetFest.
We had noticed things like this boat in Warnemünde, Germany this summer. They put various different objects like these up on poles. We figured, that they were to help you find your way from the water to your towel area.
Much further down the promenade at 2:43 , I came upon Lilly’s, which sold gelato and waffles, among other things. I ordered a Belgian waffle with chocolate. I had to wait a while at the counter, before a different person asked what I wanted and I told him I’d already ordered. He apologized and quickly heated a waffle and poured chocolate sauce over it. Even though the tiny sitting area was even hotter than outside, it was the only place really left to eat. It was delicious and I satisfied my daughters, who had told me to get street waffles. However, the heat was getting to me and I ordered a bottle of Coke Zero for 2,50. It was truly refreshing, as I continued back to the hotel at 2:55.
As I proceeded down the promenade, I saw the arcade on either side of the exit with the statue of King Leopold that I needed. I spied this statue of a guy with a fish up on the roof. That struck me as a truly weird place for that statue.
When I arrived at 3:06, the room was stifling. I ripped the three windows open, using furniture to
brace them. I worked on Facebook posts and this blog until K returned at 5:55.
By the time we pulled ourselves together to leave after he opened his birthday cards, it was 6:45. We
went up to the promenade,where it was hard to find something reasonably priced where there were seats. We wound up on the covered, side walls of glass cafe portion of Lido Sole at 7:10.
I made sure I was the one mostly in the sun to keep him from complaining. It took forever to get menus, because they were so busy. It was very warm,too, until the sun went lower and they opened the roof. It was not until 7:32 that we ordered. I chose a 33 cl Tempelier for 4 Euros and K wound up getting a total of 2 bottles of Palm for 3,20 each.
I saw the weirdest pizza on the menu and we’d realized that a neighboring customer had had it. I had to order it- pizza wuerstele e pataline- sausage and fries. The sausage turned out to be the softest hot dogs ever and the fries were unsalted. It really wasn’t bad and only cost 13 Euros. K ordered Zeetongetjes met garnituur, which was 2 filet of sole,salad and a bowl of fries. This is Belgium, after all. He liked it. It was 22 Euros. Oh, and mine came at 7:48, while his didn’t come until 8.
A couple sat at the table adjoining ours and it turned out K knew them. So, we talked for quite a while.I was really surprised to learn they were over 70.
For dessert,since it was in lieu of birthday cake, K and I split a waffle with vanilla ice cream for 5 Euros. It was good, but my chocolate one was better.
We bade the other couple goodbye and left at 9:20. K promptly ran into a guy he knew. When I said it was his birthday, the guy wanted to buy him a beer, but K was already late for the concert. We split up at 9:24.
It was cooler now as I headed back. There were folks on the beach, at the water and on the promenade. Plenty of bikes and things that were like buggies and held up to six people, but were pedaled like bikes, were every where. The sun dipping down to the water was stunning.
I was back in the room at 9:38, tired after a long day. I’d walked 5.1 miles today!
St. Paul 
On one side of the ruin.
I just really liked these curtains.
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