Ghent

We were up and ready to leave by 10 - the cornflakes we had were terrible. The free juice was great.
Will said bye to all his American friends then we went to the Gravensteen Castle. Because we are under 26 we got a 8€ discount :)
We both really really liked the castle. Only negative was the amount of stairs - the thigh burn was real.
The first main room we arrived on was full of all these BADASS medieval weapons.
They had all sorts - some I didn't even recognize or know the names of.
It had some suits of armor too.
All the items were excellently preserved.
I'm another room was a huge guillotine - it was a replica but the blade was the original. It's gruesome thinking about how many heads it had cut off. It still looks very sharp. 😧
I always find the bag\bucket next to it funny. I really shouldn't but i do.
We went up more and more stairs until we were at the top - the view of the city was spectacular. Everything just looks so old - ever though some of it isn't, they've just designed it to fit in... it works!
We then went back down the stairs to a room full of torture instruments.
I love the Gore stuff. Though admittedly, these items weren't the worst stuff I've seen - I still have no desire to experience any of them though. :S
It had a stretcher and shackles with spikes etc.
There were a lot of school excursions happening as we left one group of kids was running through the front gate wearing costumes pretending to storm the castle 😂 what a great way to learn.

Will needed the loo so we went back to the hostel for a bit before trying to find a cat cafe. IT WAS CLOSED 😭😭😭😭 so I was so very very sad except one big cutey was inside bumping it's face against the wall wanting a pat which made me happy.
I couldn't read the signs so I popped in and asked if we could come in but they said they were on holiday. 😭😭😭😭😭
Hope the beautiful baby gets adopted 😻😻 the others were probably sleeping.

One real highlight of the day was that McDonalds had salt sachets.

We went to St Bavo's cathedral which was beautiful inside and had lots of relics and such.
Goodness Catholicism is different - Will had to explain so much for me. It's like a bloody cult. I felt semi rude not dabbing the water on my head as I entered but I thought it was ruder to do something I don't believe in in the house of God.
There was an underground crypt which was cool.

The most important item of the city is the painting of the adoration of the mystic lamb.
It is significant because it is the most stolen art piece of all time.
It has a very very very long history which I can't be bother typing because it's had so much happen to it but it's really is a fascinating story which involves Napoleon, Hitler and many many others. When re reading this in years to come - go look it up again.
We paid 4€ each to see.
It wasn't what I expected... we found out later that because 1 hour a day they close the shutters so people have the chance to see the outer paintings too and while I understand this I am outraged because I didn't see the damn lamb and plan to go back tomorrow and demand free entry lol.

We then had 5 minutes to rush back to the hostel for the free walking tour - our guides name was Fabiano - he is originally from Spain.
He was very passionate.
We went round the circle introducing ourselves - a lot of Australians especially from Sydney.

The guide first talked about our hostel and how the king had stayed there - it is a pretty fantastic building.
To the right of the bridge is a graffiti drawing. This was to celebrate the Hollywood movie "monumental men" which had one of the local art works included in the movie.

We were then told a story - a man was jailed and sentenced to death by starvation. His daughter was allowed to visit because it was expected he would die quickly - a year later he was still alive. They couldn't figure out how... they eventually figured it out - our attention was drawn to a beautiful building with a design in the front.
Oh dear lord.
It's of the daughter breastfeeding her dad....
That is unequivocally not ok.
Next to it was a building everyone chucked a hissy fit over when it was built but as the guide said -people hate change - it takes one generation for things to be accepted.
It was a big open building ( more like a shelter) for performances and apparently has the most beautiful acoustics. All the concerts are normally free - they built it because over 200 days a year is crappy weather which was interfering with the performances because nobody would go because hey didn't want to have to hold an umbrella.
He linked it to the Opera house and how everyone was outraged at the cost originally and said it was ugly - now no one can even imagine the city with out it - its one of our great monuments. I understood the point he was making about generations.
We walked and looked at the Belfast tower - we still need to go up. He talked about the bell and how it was used to alert everyone of the city about well, everything really.
Next was the city hall - half was an old gothic style and the other half was renaissance.
It was because they ran out of money and by the time they had some more the fashion had changed, it was cheaper and quicker.
Went to a graffiti street - loved it! It was so so bright! They had a real big graffiti problem so they made it legal to spray paint in 3 big streets - it has stopped the problem almost completely. The guide thinks more cities should do it.
It was right next to a school so apparently kids come out and 'express themselves'.
We went to a mini city square - Fabiano pointed out 3 light posts. They are special because they are connected to the Ghent hospital and flash when a new baby is born. Everyone is the square stands up and claps for their new citizen.
He took us to the front of the Gravensteen Castle and told us some more info about it.
The castle itself has only be overrun once in its history. It was in 1942. The local university students kept buying beer on campus and turning up to class drunk so they decided to double the price. The students went into such an outrage they all stormed the castle and locked the gate 😂😂😂😂 they had to call the fire brigade to put ladders up the wall to get them out.
We did see pictures in the morning as the same ones he showed us on the tour of the ladders up the wall and smoke - we assumed there must have been a fire not unit students upset over beer prices hahaha
At the end of the tour we got a very brief history lesson.
Ghent was the richest city - the emperor was from Ghent and they wanted his attention so they stoped paying their taxes. He asked them to pay they said no so he turned up with a small army to scare them then paraded the head people of the city around it white shirts with noises around their neck.
About 400 men - majority apologized but 12 or so didn't - they were hung with the nooses already around their neck and displayed in the square.
Ghent had to pay double taxes and a lot of people left resulting in the cities future troubles. I found the tour interesting but it was lots of standing - I can walk for hours but standing still kills me.
We were told by the hostel it was free and not tipped based - they lied - we gave a pathetic 4€ tip.
We sat in the hostel with our useless charger and then booked our accommodation for Netherlands - we have decided to do Luxembourg maybe when we do Germany because there is a festival on and nothing is really available.
We have booked for Rotterdam, The Hague then Amsterdam. In Amsterdam we booked a canal boat for 2 nights 🙃🙃
After about an hour of organisms we went out for dinner - I have been wanting tomato soup so we found a cute little soup bar. For 5€ each you got a big bowl of soup with meatballs, croutons, and other garnishes + randomly an apple. It was good value.
I then went and had a strawberry shot from a bar that was recommended on the tour and by many people at the hostel. It was delicious which is super dangerous haha we then went and bought these funny cone shaped lollies which are specific to Ghent. Some dude tricked his children by injecting medicine into them back in the day. They are now a symbol for Ghent. It was like eating raw flavored sugar.
Will was still hungry so we went to find him chips, ran into the kiwis and had dinner with them by the river.
We then went home and I showered but I forgot to take soap with me so it was more of a rinse.
We sat in the common room still trying to charge our things.
There was a beer tasting session going on and they were so loud, talking about politics but what was most agitating was the Australian in the group was often wrong. The American girl, though she seemed very left winged and politically different from me I don't know enough actual facts about American political history to know any better but the Aussie dude was killing us.
He wasn't spouting opinions but incorrect facts 😩
Bed time. I finished another book 😋Read more