Taking the Kids to Antwerp, Belgium

We spent about 24 hours in Antwerp and I wish we could have spent at least two days. What an incredible city! We had a long list of things to see and do and I knew we would not be able to accomplish everything, so I decided that each of us would choose a museum and those would be our morning activities. 

Aurelia's choice was the ModeMuseum, a fashion museum. I thought it was a bit of an odd choice and actually tried to talk her out of it, but in the end it was such a fantastic museum! We walked in and the lovely front desk lady handed each child a set of pencils and the "treasure hunt." Turns out the museum has clues all over the museum and kids can hunt for them (while learning a bit of the history of Belgian fashion) and at the end there is a treasure box!

I was not allowed to take photos in the actual museum, but the kids had so much fun collecting each clue. The clues were related to a number and at the very end that number was needed to unlock the treasure box. I was a bit taken aback when we finally discovered the treasure box--it was locked and so secretive! How fun is that?! The museum is quite small and it took us about an hour to see everything and collect the answers to the clues.

 Next stop: The Museum aan de Stroom. The museum was a twenty minute walk through the city, so we were able to see a few sights on our walk over, which was perfect. The building itself is pretty fantastic and the kids could have just marveled at the view from the foyer, hahah. We chose a few of the most interesting sounding exhibits and spent about an hour and a half in the museum. Things were not as interactive, so Aurelia reached her limit after this time. Older kids could definitely spend a few hours in here.

 My choice of museum was the Red Star Line Museum. This museum was super interactive, which was great. It tells the story of the Europeans who left Europe via Antwerp and sailed to North America (USA and Canada). We learned about immigrant families from the past and current families and there were recorded stories and photos and videos--super informative and we all enjoyed this museum. I forgot to take photos, whoops!

 We spent the rest of the day wandering around the city and exploring churches, shops, small squares, etc. This is such a great city and I am sorry we couldn't spend more time here.

 Antwerp is a compact city and kids can really walk everywhere, which is great. We probably walked over 10km on this day (with breaks for food and such). There are public transport options as well, but we were happy to walk and explore.

Kids in Maastricht

August is vacation time! After a few schedule changes I ended up taking the kids to Belgium and the Netherlands for a week. We saw a few of Rory's races and had a blast exploring the area. The weather was absolutely dismal, but we didn't allow that to dampen our spirits. 

Maastricht reminded me a bit of Boulder. It is a university town with a thriving cultural scene. Lots of cool places to have coffee, fun shops, etc. We drove from our hotel in Belgium and parking in the center of the city was not a problem (though the price kind of surprised me after cheap Spanish prices).

You can see most of Maastricht on foot or by bike. We spent the morning walking around the city and we were not disappointed. I wish we could have spent another day or two exploring the city, so we will have to return in the future.

 Near the town hall we stumbled upon a market with all sorts of things. One portion held the daily food market. I am always interested in seeing other markets and I can't help but compare them to our fabulous Mercat de Lleon in Girona. The Maastricht market had clothes, fabric, flowers, baked goods, etc. It was fun to wander through and the kids found some cute little felt keychains made by a local woman and they bought them to add to their keychain collections. 

 I adore bookshops and libraries. I just can't help myself in a bookshop. Maastricht has a Dominican church that was built in the 13th century and is now the Selexyz Dominicanen bookstore and it is really worth a visit.

 The children's section had plenty of English books and I allowed (haha) the children to each choose a book. Then we wandered over to the adult books and Eston had to remind me that we were limited with our suitcase weight, so I should exercise caution when purchasing books. The shop also has a great cafe, so it is a great stop with kids after waking around town.

 We found these statues near the Sint-Janskerk Church. The church has a tower and you can climb about 459 (we started to lose count) very narrow stairs to the top of the tower. Highly recommended as it has a great view of the entire city. Aurelia made it up on her own (age 4) without issue, but be aware that the stairs are quite steep and narrow.

 My kids could have spent the day walking along the river and marveling at the boats and the houseboats. We tried not to be too stalker-ish, but it was too tempting to take a peek in the boats! We loved this area of the city.