Wing'in It: Mylee's Belgian birthday

Guess who's fourteen now?

She's only four in this shot...

Wow...time does fly. It's amazing. She did something this year on her birthday that she's never, ever done before...She celebrated it in Brussels, Belgium. Kinda cool, no?

Okay, so, Europa Park back on the 29th of April was really her birthday celebration. Maya had nothing whatsoever to do with this birthday in Belgium thing. That was all me. I'd read somewhere about a castle surrounded by many acres of land covered in Dutch gardens. The family that owns the castle still lives there, but for a month every spring, they open the grounds up to the public. Belgians speak either French or Dutch. In Dutch, the name of the castle is called Kasteel van Groot-Bijgaarden. In French it's called Chateau de Grand-Bigard. They opened it this year on April 4th and the last day to visit was to be May 5th. I didn't realize until after we'd gone that they'd extended the opening through the 12th of May. I think it's because spring had a late start around here. Many of the tulips we saw weren't even open yet.

We were on the road for a while before we crossed over into Belgium. After a few WC stops, we arrived at the castle within about four hours.

Maya at 14. What a difference 10 years makes. I so love this child...

The castle was not hard to find, although driving in Belgium was quite the experience. It is so much fun to go and explore. How cool is it to decide in the morning that you want to go to a whole other country...and can get there within two or three hours? We do realize, however, how well mannered and orderly the Germans are when we drive in places like France and Belgium. Yikes.

Here's a map of the castle and the grounds:

click to enlarge

So, we're here for flowers?

Right away I knew this was going to be an awesome excursion. The picture above was taken at the entrance of the bridge that took us to the drawbridge and the gatehouse that you see behind the kids. The bridge has five arches and spans a moat that runs around the castle.

There were some enormous fish in the moat alongside some turtles, ducks and a few swans.

We were also greeted by many pigeons.

This tower is a four story dungeon built in 1347. It is 30 meters tall. (That's about 98.5 feet.)

Construction of the castle began in 1300 and was built for Almaric Bigard, the first Lord of Bigard. It was built in the Flemish Renaissance style with red brick and a slate roof.

The door on the right is a chapel. This was the only access we had to the castle.

Posing with the flowers in front of the Donjon, or dungeon.

The kids at the "With Love From" tulip garden.

A nice shot of the arches beneath the bridge and the gatehouse.

Garden architect Louis Fuchs created the 14 hectare park alongside the castle at the start of the 20th century. (One hectare measures 10,000 square meters, so 14 of them totals 140,000 square meters...or almost 36 acres. That's a lot of tulips!)

Beautiful 'swooping' trees bordering the Exbury Gardens.

I think this is such a cool picture.

The grounds have been open each spring to the public since 2003. This year was their 10th anniversary. They say there are more than one million bulbs planted here and that all of the tulips came from the Netherlands.

Beneath the Exbury Gardens arch.

While walking through the gardens we saw a house outside of the castle property. It looked like it might be a duplex. It's pretty clear that the owners on the left side have a classical old school kind of taste...those on the right a much more modern one.

The castle from another angle.

I imagine this is what Juliet's balcony looked like. All the ivy...beautiful.

Maya took over the camera from here. When she starts telling me what shots she thinks I should get I generally just hand it over. I love that she likes photography...and it's fun to look at the pictures later and see what sorts of images she captured.

Plus I get to have my picture taken with my hubby.

I'm getting this shot enlarged. Many of the pictures we have on our walls were taken by Mylee.

I have no idea what this is...looks like a giant bird cage to me.

We went in and saw the chapel. It was filled with all different varieties and colors of orchids.

Scott standing outside of the Donjon.

What are you looking at, human?

the With Love From garden from across the moat.

After our trip to the castle, I had plans to go into the heart of Brussels. The trip was about 4 1/2 miles long and it was a little stressful.

Things were going okay...it was insanely busy being a Friday afternoon. We saw this as we drove...

The Basilica of the Sacred Heart. This is a Roman Catholic Church that was built in 1935.

...and then we went into a tunnel.

Funny thing about tunnels...the GPS doesn't work when you're inside of them. We had no idea if we were going the right way and it kept taking us down which was a bit disconcerting. All ended up well, however. Once we got back out of the tunnel and the GPS located satellites once again, we realized we hadn't veered off track at all. Here are some shots I took as we were trying to navigate ourselves to a parking garage.

Don't ask...we have no earthly idea.

This is Albert. He's also known as King of the Belgians. He ruled from 1907 - 1934.

We parked near the Royal Library of Belgium, (on the right in the picture below)

and had a beautiful view of the Grand Place from the Mont des Arts.

That tower is the Brussels City Hall.

We then took off toward the City Hall and the buildings that surround it. The area is called the Grand Place. It was a nice walk and the spire kept us going in the right direction.

There's a Hard Rock Cafe in the Grand Place! Actually, there were dozens of restaurants there. It was a very, very busy place.

Maison du Roi, (King's House) is on the right. Guildhalls is in the middle.

Brussels City Hall. On top of the spire is a twelve foot statue of St. Michael slaying a demon.

A better view of the Maison du Roi. The Museum of the City of Brussels is in this building.

We'll just pretend that I took the above shot. (The truth is that I didn't.) This is the Manneken Pis and he's very famous in Belgium. It bears a similar cultural significance as Copenhagen's Little Mermaid and is the emblem of the rebellious spirit of the city of Brussels. The statue is made of bronze and, as you can see, it is of a little boy peeing into the basin of the fountain. This little guy has been there, urinating since about 1618 and there are several legends about him but I'll just share with you the most popular one. It's about Duke Godfrey III of Leuven. In 1142, the troops of this two-year-old lord were battling against the troops of the Berthouts, the lords of Grimbergen, in Ransbeke. The troops put the infant lord in a basket and hung the basket in a tree to encourage them. From there, the boy urinated on the troops of the Berthouts, who eventually lost the battle.

(The following text is taken from a website about the Menneken Pis:)

The statue is dressed in costume several times each week, according to a published schedule which is posted on the railings around the fountain. His wardrobe consists of several hundred different costumes, many of which may be viewed in a permanent exhibition inside the City Museum, located in the Grand Place, immediately opposite the Town Hall. The costumes are managed by the non-profit association The Friends of Manneken-Pis, who review hundreds of designs submitted each year, and select a small number to be produced and used. Although the proliferation of costumes is of twentieth-century origin, the occasional use of costumes dates back almost to the date of casting, the oldest costume on display in the City Museum being of seventeenth-century origin. The changing of the costume on the figure is a colorful ceremony, often accompanied by brass band music. Many costumes represent the national dress of nations whose citizens come to Brussels as tourists; others are the uniforms of assorted trades, professions, associations, and branches of the civil and military services.

On occasion, the statue is hooked up to a keg of beer. Cups will be filled up with the beer flowing from the statue and given out to people passing by.

So, I knew this little guy was pretty important but there were so many people in the Grand Place. I kept my eye out for him there but (I found out later) he is actually not right in the Grand Place and I hadn't told Steven I was looking for him. If I had, we probably would have found him. I blame the intoxicating smell of all the beautiful and wonderful hyacinths at the castle for clouding my brain. If you want to learn more about this statue, check out this website: http://www.brussels.be/artdet.cfm/4328

Before we left the Grand Place, we did go and check out the City Hall.