paris to Amsterdam w. a day trip between

I felt in love with Brugge. Easy to stroll by foot and safe, lovely and easier by bike. It is 1 hour from Brussels or Antwerpen, when you can take the Thalys train. Or spend one more hour traveling and take the ICI train to Amsterdam if you don't want to take the Thalys.

The only thing you would regret is not staying two nights instead of one. BTW, if you can stretch to 2 nights, do it.

One of the highlights of my trip around Europe is my bike ride in Brugge at night in the day of my arrival, I felt like a small kid that never wanted to stop. It was just a short trip to the local laundry but when I discovered the magic of riding a bike around this fairy tale town with no destination at all, it ended up like a magical fly in two wheels.

I would never stop riding that night if I didn't have my Gouden Carolus Cuvee Van de Keizer Blauw I bought earlier that day at Brussels (great and worthy 3-4 hours stop) waiting for me at my B&B.

Seconded. Brugge (local spelling) = medieval + quaint + beer + chocolate + good food. Plenty for both of you.
The station is on the edge of the old town, with 2 trains per hour from Brussels.

Thirded. Brugge/Bruges is charming, and if you arrive early enough in the day, it does have a couple of small, quality museums with great, worthwhile art by Flemish masters, but also a climbable medieval bell tower with a great view, and other (non art-museum) sights. They've got a concert hall, too, with performances in January. Ouside of winter, there are also boat tours on its canals and free carillon concerts in the bell tower courtyard, for when you come back the next time.

Belgians argue their beer is the best in the world, and several varieties are available for sampling and drinking.

Train connections to and from Bruges are easy. If you take the high-speed Thalys trains Amsterdam-Brussels and later Brussels-Paris, you can choose a ticket type called "Any Belgian Station" or Brussels ABS, which covers the local train (not Thalys) connection from Brussels to Bruges any time within 24 hours of your reserved train (just show the same ticket onboard both trains). If you buy tickets from our US agent then you actually request them to/from Bruges and they work the same as described above; the Brussels-Bruges portion is not reserved and you could even choose a different Belgian town. Book Thalys tickets early for best prices.

Another vote for Bruges! It is an incredibly romantic town. We had fun taking the beer tour at De Halve Maan Brewery, and drinking the delicious free glass of beer at the end. If you go, check out the 500 year old Herberg Vlissinghe pub. Great beer and ambiance!

It's about 3 hours by train from Amsterdam to Bruges, and then from Bruges to Paris it's a little over 2.5 hours. We did this exact route last November.

I'd strongly consider Brugge in these circumstances.

Since you mention "not too crowded" and aren't interested in museums, you may prefer to go to Ghent rather than Bruges. It's closer to Brussels and less heavily loaded with tourists than Bruges, while being almost as picturesque and having a livelier bar scene.

Thanks for all the suggestions Burgge sounds awesome, but how do we get there? It seems there are only evening trains from Brussels which kills our whole day. Doesnt seem to make sense to travel there just to sleep and continue to paris...?

I believe there are two or three trains every hour throughout the day and evening going between Brussels to Bruges. Check out http://ricksteves.raileurope.com/us/rail/point_to_point/triprequest.htm .

Ghent is on the same rail line, in between Brussels and Bruges.

Katrina, there are 2 trains every hour from Brussels to Brugge (and back again) from early morning to late at night. It is a "turn up and go* service.

where are you looking to only see trains in the evening; and are you looking at whatever the time is wherever you want to travel or defaulting to whatever time DB or whichever is at locally?

In other words, if you are in Chicago at lunch time of noon and looking at a website where local time in Europe is 7 hours later at 1900 or 7pm, your default would be that time and you would see evening trains unless you changed the requested time to 0800 or something else.

Nigel, I suspect that she's looking at some site that only shows high-speed trains. There are a couple of daily Thalys services between Bruges and Paris via Brussels aimed at the Belgian business market, so they return from Brussels to Bruges in the late evening.

Katrina, don't worry about booking rail tickets between Brussels and Bruges for specific trains. If you book the "any Belgian station" tickets mentioned above they won't be limited to single trains, and if you book Brussels-Bruges separately there is no discount for advance booking for domestic Belgian services, so you might as well wait until you get to Brussels.

Echoing Philip, I think Ghent would be a better fit than Bruges. If it matters, it's closer to Brussels and lodging is cheaper than Bruges. After dark (and you'll have lots of dark in January), the Gothic buildings and bridges are floodlit and really beautiful.

Look at the timetable for trains from Brussels to Ghent and Bruges also to the duration. Usely the one to Ghent needs a ½ hour, but some 1 hour and even more. Most to Bruges need 1 hour, but a few daily exceptions more than 2.