Bruges! from Diabetes Wise: Blogging about real life with diabetes

I'm incredibly slow with this update, but Rob and I spent last weekend in the beautiful Belgian city of Bruges.

We'd planned the weekend to visit the Christmas markets and experience the newly opened St Pancras International and High Speed 1 rail link on the Eurostar. However, we'd timed it principally to coincide with my parents visiting Bruges as part of a short winter cruise break.

Saturday morning felt particularly early, given that my work Christmas party had ended up scheduled for the evening before. But the check in and security procedures for Eurostar are a dream for someone who has regular experience of Heathrow Airport! The new high speed line, opened along with the new St Pancras International Station on Novemebr the 14th, allows for 185mph operation over the entire route with the exception of the Channel Tunnel itself, where speeds are capped for safety reasons. It took just a little over two and half hours from check in, and a little under two hours from the train departing, to reach Brussels.

Which is faster than my regular London-Liverpool commute! Enough said.

Sadly the onward journey from Brussels was not so smooth. Some kind of staff action was causing horrendous delays and there was very little information on when and if trains to Bruges would be departing. What little information there was was provided in Flemish and French, which it fell to me to translate, since Rob does not speak French at all. I always find it surprising how much French I am able to understand, and even at a push actually speak, given how long it is since I studied it. More surprising still is how much Flemish I am accurately able to read given that I've never studied the language, but this perhaps because in written form it has strong similarities to the three languages I have studied - English, French and German.

The transfer to Bruges ended up taking as long as the London-Brussels leg, but we made it in time for a quick lunch before visiting the Snow and Ice Sculpture Festival at the Stationsplein.

Me, with an ice penguin

It was a cold weekend in Bruges, but after wondering around the sculptures we were keen to get back outside, where it was warmer!

We headed to our central hotel and then took a wander around the Christmas markets. It was not only cold, but also quite wet, which provided ample excuses for frequent stops to get warm and shelter. We began with waffles, drenched in Belgian chocolate sauce (absolutely divine) followed later by warming gluwein and plenty of local beers.

The only diabetes moment of the weekend came shortly before dinner when the cold, the walking and probably an overestimated bolus for the waffles caught up with me and sent my blood sugar crashing to 1.9 (35), which left me feeling a little hungover and reduced my appetite for dinner. We still had a wonderful evening though.

Sunday was a brighter day, if still very cold. We had a leisurely buffet style breakfast at our hotel and had time for some Christmas shopping before meeting my parents in the central market square. Although time was limited, we fitted in some sightseeing, a further perusal of the markets, more Gluwein and a delicious lunch of Mussels washed down by more Belgian beer!

Sadly we didn't have a lot more time before we had to hop on a train back to Brussels and the Eurostar home and my parents had to get back to their ship. I would have loved to have stayed longer, but had to work on Monday morning. The beauty of Eurostar is that it brings several European cities close enough for a very short trip like this, or even a day trip, without necessitating taking time off work. I've no doubt we'll go back soon.

Rob didn't have to work on Monday or Tuesday and I was treated to the novel experience of being greeted with a ready prepared dinner and a glass of wine as I arrived home on Monday evening. It made me wish just that little bit harder that we weren't two hundred miles apart on a daily basis.

Overall though, it made for a wonderful weekend!