Our first night was in Bruges and the weather was biblical, we had sleet, hail and gales, fortunately we are still travel-fresh, enthusiastic and hardened by living in Yorkshire! I wasn’t sure my super-light down Uniqlo jacket (picked because it packs down into a tiny bag) was going to hack it. I had visions of channeling Joey from Friends and wearing all my layers at the same time- but we fired up the Webasto heater and it totally did the job. We were warm as toast watching ‘In Bruges’ to get in the zone. Sadly Colin Farrell was nowhere to be seen in Bruges, so Mr G filled in!

Today was a classic Gilbert-style whistle-stop yomp around beautiful Bruges: Climb the tower, tick, Belgian waffle, tick, Canals and bridges, tick, Belgian beer tick. The good news is that we made it safely up the narrow winding stairs to the top of the tower and no one pushed anyone off!

We couldn’t resist the lure of the Torture Museum, a truly gory celebration of torture techniques from the macabre and Medieval to devices that were still being used in the late twentieth century. I don’t know if Mr G was looking for inspiration- but I think he knows that there’s no more effective torture than putting something in the wrong place in the van and letting me hunt out the rattle.

Finally a quick campsite comment:

We stayed at Camping Memling

Veltemweg 109
8310 Brugge
België

The good bits: It was in a quiet location about 3k from Bruges. We walked it in 40 minutes- and we were pootling and looking in shops en route. The showers were warm, clean and the water was plentiful- one of the best we’ve stayed in. Laundry and washing-up facilities were also excellent and there’s a communal lounge with a coffee machine which is a bonus. Bus stop, supermarket and lovely delis all within 500 metres. We’d really recommend this spot.

The bad bits: Not much to be fair, it was 30 Euro a night, which is on the higher end but brilliantly run and very much worth the extra.