DAY 12: Second Day in Bruges

I wanted to get lost in Bruges today. Familiarize myself with the city visually. Bruges is an easy city to navigate. The overbearing towers are beacons. The Belfort tower brings you right to the city center and it’s clearly visible almost anywhere you are in Bruges. Easy to reach.

Bruges certainly has that walking-through-time feel. Ralph Fiennes’ character in the film, “In Bruges”, describes it as a fairytale town. At one point in the film, Brendan Gleeson’s character converses with Ralph Fiennes over the phone about Colin Ferrell’s distaste for Bruges and Ralph has this to say in response to Colin’s opinion:

“It’s a fairytale fucking town, isn’t it? How can a fairytale town not be somebody’s fucking thing? How can all those canals and bridges and cobbled streets and those churches, all that beautiful fucking fairytale stuff, how can that not be somebody’s fucking thing, eh?”

However, staying here for the length of time that I am, I can understand where Colin’s character is coming from. Longer than a week in Bruges and you may lose your mind. It’s beautiful, yes, but you can knock out the sightseeing in a singly day and feel ready to leave. I was only in the city for a couple hours and already feeling I’d seen what I wanted to.

Took a canal tour, which was relaxing. I got shushed by the driver for talking during his tour though. They sat me next to a cute blonde girl on the far right side toward the front so I could balance the boat and I chatted her up. She was from Wyoming and visiting Bruges before meeting with her boyfriend in Amsterdam… Damn!

After the canal ride, I continued wandering, marking visual checkpoints on a map. It’s been wonderful to have my full attention preoccupied with my surroundings. My phone is never on or used, really. Feels as though a piece of my brain that I didn’t want there to begin with has been removed. Applying myself fully to exploration. Figuring out a new world without the disruption of a phone call or text message; I could get use to this.