8 days in Belgium? Or should we mix it up by going to London?

If you stay in Belgium for most of your time, consider a day trip or overnight trip to Bruges - a beautiful, "quaint" village/town - cute shops, medieval buildings, wonderful art, lovely canal through town, very walkable, within a short train ride of Brussels.

Thank you; yes, we'll definitely go to Bruges at some point.

Gosh. Eight days in Belgium. 3 days too many in my opinion. Yes, go to London, or yes, go to Paris for a few days. However, if you do stay in Belgium, visit Antwerp for at least a day.

Thank you! That's interesting, a lot of folks seem to have that sentiment about Belgium. We like chocolate, food, beer and quaintness, so I think we'll like it just fine! However, we are heavily leaning toward the bolded itinerary in my original post (3 nights in Belgium, 4 nights in England, 2 nights in Belgium).

We spent eight days in Belgium and loved it! After landing in Brussels we went straight to Antwerp by bus and spent two nights. Train back to Brussels for two nights. We day tripped from there to Ghent since we were underwhelmed by Brussels. Train to Brugge for two nights. Picked up a car and headed for Tournai stopping in Ypres along the way. Then headed into the Ardennes, spending a night in Rochefort, before heading back toward Brussels spending the last night in Leuven before catching our flight home.
Yes, we moved around a lot but that's what we like to do. The driving was relaxing and we really wanted to spend our time in only one country. I love Belgium and would vote to spend all your time there but get out of the cities and towns and see some of the country side.

The obvious links would be London by the Eurostar or Amsterdam or Paris by train. All have enough to keep you busy for 4 nights or more. Crawley isn't the usual choice in the UK!

Please note that there are school half term holidays during the duration of your trip, so places will be busier and accommodation will be booked well in advance.

If you are needing to be in Crawley consider staying here http://www.alexanderhotels.co.uk/langshott-manor-luxury-hotel-surrey/. It's 6 miles away. We stayed there recently. Very romantic, fabulous restaurant.

Thanks a bunch to the last 3 who posted! We are leaning even more heavily toward our aforementioned 3-4-2 itinerary now; not wanting to regret staying in just one place when so much is so close. The hotel recommendation near Crawley looks fabulous. It might end up being out of our budget, but regardless, thanks for the thought! Also, thanks for the information regarding much being booked in advance during the time of our trip. That sort of insight is so helpful!

It would not generally occur to me to make an eight day trip cover two countries. You would spend a day of your trip going back and forth, half a day times two. So I would not tack on England, surely there is enough in Belgium to keep you interested. Plus you'd have to back track for your flight home and it's not enough time in London. You actually might be able to absorb any change fee if you avoided having to pay to backtrack and wanted to go open jaw.. But rather than go to England, I might consider some place in the Netherlands if you must tack something on. I have only been to Bruges and passed through Brussels long enough to see the Grand Place, regretting it a lot that we did not have time for the art museum. I could spent eight days between Bruges-Ghent-Brussels without getting bored. I understand the part about not liking tours, but if were going there I would find some way to may it to the WWI sights in Flanders.

I would suggest for Belgium that you allot 3 nights to see Brussels, Bruges and Ghent. Consider more time to visit Amsterdam and places in Netherlands. Also, you could do a loop that would start in Brussels, then Amsterdam, Cologne and Trier, Germany, then, Luxembourg, returning to Brussels.

We just had 3 nights in Belgium (Ghent) after 8 nights in NL back in April. We quite enjoyed Belgium - we went in with no preconceived notions, so it helped. I could certainly see, in the future, going back for a week, so we could take our time and enjoy more, and prob have a car rental.

Plus...chocolate!

We had a few hours in Antwerp (during our switch from NL to Ghent), most of a day in Bruges and a partial day in Ypres. (And a few hours in Brussels while waiting to catch the train to Paris). If I was to stay a week, I'd def split the time up between somewhere like 3 days in Bruges and 3-4 in Antwerp or Ghent.

If you didn't want to travel all the way to England, you could def hit some lovely spots in NL - we stayed in Dordrecht 3 nights and visited Gouda and Kinderdijk, but there seemed to be tons of places around and we had a hard time deciding.

And if you are interested in WW1 - def take the time to visit the In Flanders Fields museum in Ypres, and stay for Last Post at Menin Gate.

I don't know that I'd ever expect to see Crawley in such esteemed company. I assume you need to be there for some reason, but just in case, it really isnt a tourist destination! Really really!

If you like a gentle mooch, there are nice smaller places nearby. As a random suggestion, maybe look up The Griffin in Fletching, Sussex. An old coaching inn in a tiny half timbered village with excellent food and beer and about 8 lovely rooms for overnight stays.

Otherwise... Brussels is ok but nothing special. Ghent, Antwerp and Bruges are all more worthy of some time. Even if you've been before, hey, Amsterdam is always good too right?

Crawley? Really?

It can't be for the layover and breakfast for the Veteran London to Brighton run because that's not until Bonfire day (but loads of fun).

OK, I'm sure it must have some romantic associations for you. Hey ho.

There is a Holiday Inn Express on the Squareabout, not far by bus or foot to the station.

Hahahaha...sorry, I should've mentioned that we have a sort of "sister" church in Crawley, and so we wanted to connect with folks there!

Thanks so much for the ideas. We are still hemming and hawing a bit, and are trying to figure out what we should couple with Belgium. My wife really wants to spend a few days in a cool city, like London or Paris etc. Cologne might fit the bill, too.

This thread seems to have been replaced by a similarly titled one at

https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/belgium/8-days-in-belgium

where the story continues.

That was not a replacement, but a slightly different version for Belgium folks