The Beautiful Aldstaat and... Chocolate?!

Extra weekend is always fun!

So this time, it's Belgium time...
be welcome
be .brussels

Booked the ticket a week before and have no itinerary...
Yes, saking galaunya :))

Anyway got in Brussels a little bit morning, so I have to strolling around the old town before the check-in time. Had booked Le Coup de Coeur Apartment Tête d'Or from booking.com as usual. I kinda like its looks because it's simple and... it just 1 minute walking to Grote Markt. Memutuskan untuk book tempat yang private because I'll spend more than 1 night here.

At 12 I went to their "receptionist" asking for my keys just to find out that the apartment won't be ready until 1.
Anyway is it just me or people in here is not very friendly? Berasa agak2 dicuekin sama mba-mba nya padahal yah dia-nya yang nggak ontime, pas agak komplain kenapa belum siap apt-nya, jawabnya santai bangetttt... *kemudian kesel.

I actually kinda tired having walking around the old town for couple hours, so then I decided to see the Manekin Piss first because it just a few minutes walks. It was a small manekin anyway... and there were A LOT of people taking pictures of that tiny manekin, and... this is unpredictable, the manekin was wearing an army uniform. Too bad I didn't take the picture of it because at the afternoon it changed its outfit into Changshan. I really wish I can took the picture of it without any outfit :))

Then after spending time around at Jardin du Mont des Arts Garden and at the Old England (slash Musical Museum Instruments), hey it's 1 already.
So I searched the apartment and got stranded in a front of Museum of Cocoa and Chocolate, then I thought "oh mine is probably in 2nd floor".
So I just take a step into the 2nd floor before a girl yelled asked me for a ticket. So yeah, I got stray... just so I wouldn't feel shame... I bought the €14 ticket, luckily the chocolate samples which was a praline and the creamy hot chocolate was delicious.
So it happens the apartment is exactly next to the museum, 3rd floor, exhausting, but a comfy one.

Then story about fries.
Yes, fries, €3.2 fries.
I never notice that Belgian Fries are famous and... famous.
That noon I decided to have it for lunch, so I went to this Fritland which seems to be one of the famous Belgian fries seller according to Trip Advisor, and here goes the chat:
Me (M): *after waiting in queu* One French Fries please.
Mas-mas ganteng (G): No, we don't have French Fries here.
M: *melongo, jeda beberapa detik* No French Fries?????
G: No, we don't sell French Fries here *sambil senyum2*
M: *mulai kesel karena liat tumpukan kentang goreng di belakang mas-mas ganteng*
G: *mungkin karena saya kelamaan melongo akhirnya... * It's Belgium, not France.
M: *after a long pause... ahhhh... Belgium Fries, yes, one please.
G: *akhirnya ngambilin kentang goreng.

So you won't find any French Fries in Belgium, but I don't know what McDonalds there called it. This is my cone of Belgian Fries with samurai sauce (they said it's the spicy one, but then as usual nothing really spicy here).

This is my cone of Belgian Fries with samurai sauce, they said it's the spicy one, but then as usual, nothing really spicy here, (snap for the blur pic!) 

In Brussel, I took my first Oyster.
I never wanna taste this things.............
But a friend took us to this Chez Léon and he said this is one of the best in town.
So then I ordered about EUR18 Provençale. This one is with butter, tomatoes, garlic and cheese. The most make sense collaboration for me. If this I cannot managed to swallow this things, at least I still have the taste of tomatoes and cheese....
My friend ordered Gratin, it's with butter, nutmeg, and cheese.
Too cut the long story short, I finished it all by myself... I even took 2 of my friend's Gratin. I just need a lot of lemons.

So the first day me and a friend spending the whole day at Aldstaat. The next day we decided to have one-day trip to Bruges (after debating a whole night whether to choose Antwerp, Ghent or... we even considered for Luxembourg).

Approximately an hour away with train from Brussels, when we step up at the old town, we knew that we chose the right town.
It's a canal town (what a my-term *eyes rolled). It's like we ended up at a fairy tale city. We didn't entered any museums, but we did try the boat trips (it's a must!).
It's a romantic old town even there were a lot of tourists, we still be able to enjoy our whole-day-walking (literally walking the whole day).
Even you aren't a selfie/wefie-holic, you will take a lot of pictures in here.

Strolling around really made us hungry (we just stopped by to eat some fries during the day), so when the day started to get dark, we decided to have a hot chocolate at, well actually I already set my eyes in this place the minute I saw it.

It's called The Old Chocolate House.
The first floor is store selling of course any kind of chocolate (pralines, chocolate milk, chocolate bars) and biscuits, gingerbreads, and marzipan.
The second floor is what they called the tearoom, besides hot chocolate they also have tea, infusion, and coffee. For the menu you can check in here.

I ordered dark-salted hot chocolate with caramel while my friend ordered the classic one. We also ordered assortment of homemade delicacies (it's a lot, it's delicious, it's... we just couldn't eat them all, full-stomach-alert) since I can't order the tiramisu (this guy told us that it contain alcohol so we probably can't consume it, and thank you very much to him for letting us know about it *a-happy-customer-detected).

The next day we still have a little extra time a Brussels, so we bought ticket to see Mini Europe. Sadly it was closed, but we did still have the Atomium.

The rest of day before flight, I spent time in Aldstaat for the ultimate goal in here, chocolate shopping. Wondering from one store to another, Godiva, Neuhaus, Galler, Leonidas, etc.
Yes, I took them all with me back to Warsaw *evilgrin.