Belgium and Holland Days 1 &2: Ghent

Andrew and I returned last night from 10 days in Belgium and the Netherlands (Holland).  Before you start flipping out and getting the wrong idea...this was not that trip.  That trip will not be blogged about until the finale of the Bachelor this spring.  That trip won't even be mentioned until then.   You gotta wait to hear about that trip.  In the meantime, enjoy the pics from this amazing trip :).

 

This is how Andrew and I work...last spring, Andrew said, "hey, why don't we go to NYC for the weekend in October?".  That sentence turned into 10 days in Europe.  We just start planning and our love for travel takes over and before you know it, we've planned a trip to the other side of the pond.  This was the first time we traveled without both kiddos in a long time.  The last time we went to Holland, the kiddos were 21 and 5 months old.  It was so much fun to go with just the hubby but at the same time, we missed them a lot.  We really do love traveling with our kids.  Thank you to the awesome Lovie and Papa Jay for taking care of our babies (they are already taking care of Sean's babies too...Lola and Ellie).  I'm sure it was kind of like a zoo at their house.

 

Here we are...about to board our flight to Amsterdam.

 

Not going to lie...I really, really enjoyed flying without the kids.  I love them dearly but having 10 hours to myself to read magazines and cookbooks and watch whatever I wanted on my i-Pad without them was glorious.  Flying with kids isn't the easiest thing to do, so flying without them seemed like 10 hours of sheer bliss.

 

Oh heavens!  As soon as our plane touched down, we were walking to baggage claim and I saw this at Starbucks...in Europe, they have a Apple Crumble Latte!  What?!  Yes, I had to stop for one.  It was a fall delight.  Maybe next year, they'll bring it to the US.  It was yummy!

 

 

We rented a car in Amsterdam and drove 2 hours to beautiful Ghent, Belgium.  This is where we stayed the first 5 nights.  Ghent was incredibly beautiful.  I loved, loved, loved it.  It was a little drizzly the first day, but we totally didn't mind.  We welcomed the cold and drizzle.

 

 

 

A picture of our hotel.  Isn't it in the perfect spot?  Right there on the water.  It is the Marriott Ghent.  I may be the actual travel agent but Andrew picked out everything to do with this trip and he did a fantastic job.  This hotel and our view of the water was amazing.

 

Me and my first Belgian waffle.  There are no words.  It was like a warm chocolate chip cookie.  It was heavenly. It was the first of 3,456 waffles I consumed on this trip.  Trust me...keep reading about this vacation and you will gain weight.  The food was that good.  Even you'll gain a few just seeing the pictures. :)

 

 

This was the view from our hotel room.

 

 

In this picture, we've been up for almost 48 hours.  We're happy and tired.  It was a great first full day in Belgium!