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fluffymarkAs some of you will have noticed from my comments, I'm back again from my travels.
You know that nice feeling you get when you've just discovered something wonderful you never thought could possibly exist, but then you find not only it exists, but it's better that you ever imagined? This sums up my feeling for Bruges. I'd been to Belgium several times before, and it had always somehow escaped my radar. Now I've caught it!
It's a town that the passage of time somehow missed - partly due to economic death between the 16th and 20th centuries meaning little new development happening during that time, and being spared from the bombs of World War 2 - the entire city center has not a single even vaguely modern building in it. And the number of horse drawn carriages in the city center exceeds the number of cars. The town sings along to the clip clop chip clop of horses, not the vroom of cars. This cheers me immensely. I kept expecting to see people in Victorian capes and top hats striding through the cobbled streets, but sadly there were none of those. It was all hauntingly nice.
What I did inevitably find was a lot of chocolate and some very nice fruit beer, some of which I have brought back with me. Yummy. We stayed at a cheap hostel that called itself Bauhaus, so many goth points for us there. Actually, we did find goths in Bruges, they seem to inhabit the fake Irish pub, and I don't blame them as the music was agreeable and the beer there was fantastic! For my birthday itself we went on a daytrip to Ghent and pootled around the castle and other places there, and unexpectedly ran into a goth shop, and I ended up being a bit poorer but having gained a large pink+black very fluffy coat! Plus the nice shop owner gave me a free badge as it was my birthday. Yay! *bounce*
Please take some time to have a look at my photos of pretty Bruges!!! Yay!
You know that nice feeling you get when you've just discovered something wonderful you never thought could possibly exist, but then you find not only it exists, but it's better that you ever imagined? This sums up my feeling for Bruges. I'd been to Belgium several times before, and it had always somehow escaped my radar. Now I've caught it!
It's a town that the passage of time somehow missed - partly due to economic death between the 16th and 20th centuries meaning little new development happening during that time, and being spared from the bombs of World War 2 - the entire city center has not a single even vaguely modern building in it. And the number of horse drawn carriages in the city center exceeds the number of cars. The town sings along to the clip clop chip clop of horses, not the vroom of cars. This cheers me immensely. I kept expecting to see people in Victorian capes and top hats striding through the cobbled streets, but sadly there were none of those. It was all hauntingly nice.
What I did inevitably find was a lot of chocolate and some very nice fruit beer, some of which I have brought back with me. Yummy. We stayed at a cheap hostel that called itself Bauhaus, so many goth points for us there. Actually, we did find goths in Bruges, they seem to inhabit the fake Irish pub, and I don't blame them as the music was agreeable and the beer there was fantastic! For my birthday itself we went on a daytrip to Ghent and pootled around the castle and other places there, and unexpectedly ran into a goth shop, and I ended up being a bit poorer but having gained a large pink+black very fluffy coat! Plus the nice shop owner gave me a free badge as it was my birthday. Yay! *bounce*
Please take some time to have a look at my photos of pretty Bruges!!! Yay!
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Date: 2004-02-18 04:51 pm (UTC)Re:
Date: 2004-02-18 05:01 pm (UTC)A technique called "espalier" also helps urban gardeners produce food using minimal space. Espalier means training young fruit trees to grow on wires. This technique is used extensively in Europe where gardening space is limited. Young fruit trees are trained to grow in shapes ranging from a single horizontal cordon to an ornate Belgian fence. Pruning encourages growth at various angles and enhances fruiting. Because the pruning technique restricts growth, dwarf varieties of fruit tree varieties are used in espaliers."
Re:
Date: 2004-02-20 01:47 am (UTC)I think you've solved that mystery! Funny thing is I'd heard of espalier before now and seen photos similar to the above, but without the leaves the trees look so different I'd not made the connection! Silly me. Also, these weren't dwarf trees in Bruges - they were often fully sized and looked like that!