Waitlisted on the Belgium/Holland tour and hopeful for the waitlist to come through.
In the meantime thinking after a very long international flight that I would like 2 nights in Brussels to sightsee before heading to the start of my tour in Bruges. Has anyone stayed in Brussels before starting on this Rick Steves tour? Any suggestions would be helpful. Don't want to pay more than $650 for the two nights. Thank you.
I did not stay in Brussels before this tour (went to Ghent from Paris) but I've stayed there previously. I stayed at the Ibis off Grand Place which is literally a 5 minute walk to the Grand Place and about the same from the Centraal Station. The area felt pretty safe to me as opposed to the area around the Midi (South) station. There are 2 other hotels on the Place Agora - a Novotel (same chain as Ibis just a bit up the chain in stars, lol) and an NH Brussels.
LOTS of restaurants around there, the very cool old arcaded shopping mall from 1850-ish, Galerie Royale Saint-Hubert.
I hope your wait-list comes thru! This is an excellent tour. Lots of interesting sights over a variety of time frames! Here is my TR although it's pre-Covid.
We stayed at Hôtel La Légende. It’s a few minutes walk from the train station, a block or so from the Manneken Pis statue and a couple blocks from the Grand Place. We only stayed at it for a night prior to departure and it was fine. In 2018 it could have used some renovations, but was perfectly adequate for the night we were there.
Thank you all for the good advice on hotels. Once my waitlist says I have a spot on the bus and date I will be reviewing each hotel and be on my way
Thanks again!
And not trying to be pedantic but the tour start is in Ghent instead of Bruges.
IF you decided to go to Ghent directly from the airport there are trains that take under an hour. Some have a change in Brussels, some don't. Some are milk runs so take closer to 1.5 hours. The fares are inexpensive (under 20E) and do not need to be bought ahead of time so no worries about timing a train for when your flight arrives.
I like Ghent much more than Brussels (have been to both a number of times) as it just feels more, uh....Belgium, lol. There is plenty to do in Ghent for an extra day and a half. Brussels is more cosmopolitan to me - a big European city. IF there is something in Brussels you want to see, then by all means, stay over there. If not and you were just looking for a place to be to get over jet lag, I'd go on to Ghent. The train station you want for Ghent is Gent-Sint-Pieters.
