It's Sunday and for those of you who've followed our past adventures, you know we find a church (usually a Catholic church) or more accurately, a mass. Today we're off to the Church of Our Lady snd we're only about 20" late for the mass. Fortunately, Tim knows the sequence and tells me we're about halfway through; we're hoping that for our contribution to the offertory we can get a peak at the famous Michelangelo's Mother and Child, the only one of his works to leave Italy during his lifetime.
The problem is that the mass is in Belgian (?), German, Dutch - some language we certainly don't understand. What we do catch is the invitation for anyone who wants to see the rest of the church which is under renovation, follow the group out to the right of the altar. Thinking we're pretty slick and going to get an insider's peak at the Michelangelo, we join the crowd and go 'behind the scenes' and are treated to a long lecture on the state of the renovations . . . in a language we still don't understand! Hoping, hoping, hoping that we will finish at the statue, we hang in there . . . I take a few photos:
Loved the juxtaposition of Tyvek and stained glass . . .
And this strange hand sticking out of the wall . . .
One of the many altars, either already renovated or not in need of it . . .
After about 15-20" we decide we've had enough and the Michelangelo doesn't appear to be housed in the construction area (duh!) but maybe we can find it on our own. Now this is a huge church, one of the largest in all of Bruges (which boasts over 1100 churches - they're now down to 1 brewery from 1100 - for this population of 25,000). And, voila, I spy what looks very much like the Madonna with Child! And there are only a few people there . . .
Oh duh, the reason there are only a few people there is that this isn't IT!! It's nice, it's marble, it's about the right size, right subjects, but it's not the real thing . . . we turn around and see this long line of folks, each of whom are forking over 8 euros to look at the 'real' thing. We've had enough; we'll catch some more Michelangelos on our next trip to Italy. Time for our canal boat ride - the number 1 tourist thing to do in Bruges.
The wait is short and the boats are comfortable and not terribly crowded.
We see a number of places we walked yesterday, this time with a new perspective. Interesting . . . Bruges is often compared with Venice (they call Venice the 'Bruges of the South') but unlike Venice where the canals are the commercial and tourist arterials, Bruges has no commercial boats, save these tour boats. There are no boathouses, no moorings, no access from the houses that front the canals and, other than the boat that makes the journey from Bruges to Dam, apparently no other water traffic. And these canals are very shallow - only 1-2 meters deep.
The public hospital with a gate (white wood) for the admitting of quarantined patients (by boat). For many years, this hospital not only treated the sick and wounded, it was also an inn and provided food and shelter for travelers, hence the word 'hospitality'. The nuns from the nearby Beguinage staffed the hospital and the inn.
Definitely one of the lowest clearance bridges on the canals; even the shortest of us couldn't help but duck.
One of the more spectacular views, the tower of the Church of Our Lady.
This wood-cladded building has nothing to recommend it architecturally or historically; its fame comes from it being the setting for a recent movie, "In Bruges", starring Colin Farrell (another stimulus to tourism!). Apparently, Colin Farrell jumped out of one of these windows in his hotel room and landed either in the water or in the adjacent pub.
My favorite shot on the whole tour - Fidel the dog in his typical resting point in the window. He even has a pad to soften the window sill!
Lovely excursion and a wonderful way to experience Bruges. . . . even if we didn't get to see the Michelangelo.
The problem is that the mass is in Belgian (?), German, Dutch - some language we certainly don't understand. What we do catch is the invitation for anyone who wants to see the rest of the church which is under renovation, follow the group out to the right of the altar. Thinking we're pretty slick and going to get an insider's peak at the Michelangelo, we join the crowd and go 'behind the scenes' and are treated to a long lecture on the state of the renovations . . . in a language we still don't understand! Hoping, hoping, hoping that we will finish at the statue, we hang in there . . . I take a few photos:
Loved the juxtaposition of Tyvek and stained glass . . .
And this strange hand sticking out of the wall . . .
One of the many altars, either already renovated or not in need of it . . .
After about 15-20" we decide we've had enough and the Michelangelo doesn't appear to be housed in the construction area (duh!) but maybe we can find it on our own. Now this is a huge church, one of the largest in all of Bruges (which boasts over 1100 churches - they're now down to 1 brewery from 1100 - for this population of 25,000). And, voila, I spy what looks very much like the Madonna with Child! And there are only a few people there . . .
Oh duh, the reason there are only a few people there is that this isn't IT!! It's nice, it's marble, it's about the right size, right subjects, but it's not the real thing . . . we turn around and see this long line of folks, each of whom are forking over 8 euros to look at the 'real' thing. We've had enough; we'll catch some more Michelangelos on our next trip to Italy. Time for our canal boat ride - the number 1 tourist thing to do in Bruges.
The wait is short and the boats are comfortable and not terribly crowded.
We see a number of places we walked yesterday, this time with a new perspective. Interesting . . . Bruges is often compared with Venice (they call Venice the 'Bruges of the South') but unlike Venice where the canals are the commercial and tourist arterials, Bruges has no commercial boats, save these tour boats. There are no boathouses, no moorings, no access from the houses that front the canals and, other than the boat that makes the journey from Bruges to Dam, apparently no other water traffic. And these canals are very shallow - only 1-2 meters deep.
The public hospital with a gate (white wood) for the admitting of quarantined patients (by boat). For many years, this hospital not only treated the sick and wounded, it was also an inn and provided food and shelter for travelers, hence the word 'hospitality'. The nuns from the nearby Beguinage staffed the hospital and the inn.
Definitely one of the lowest clearance bridges on the canals; even the shortest of us couldn't help but duck.
One of the more spectacular views, the tower of the Church of Our Lady.
This wood-cladded building has nothing to recommend it architecturally or historically; its fame comes from it being the setting for a recent movie, "In Bruges", starring Colin Farrell (another stimulus to tourism!). Apparently, Colin Farrell jumped out of one of these windows in his hotel room and landed either in the water or in the adjacent pub.
My favorite shot on the whole tour - Fidel the dog in his typical resting point in the window. He even has a pad to soften the window sill!
Lovely excursion and a wonderful way to experience Bruges. . . . even if we didn't get to see the Michelangelo.
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