Brussels ROCKS!!

Wow.  That's all I have to say.  We arrived in Brussels around 11 today and I instantly liked it more than Dublin.  It's about 10 to 15 degrees warmer here, and it's really cute and clean.  People drive on the right sicde of the road, so I feel less like I'm going to get blindsided by a car at any moment.  We dropped our stuff off at the hostel (which is really cute!) and started walking around.  We wandered into a pedestrian shopping area with tons of shops and chocolate specialty stores, and this crazy beer store.  They have every type of Belgian beer you can imagine!  It's legal to drink on the streets here, so we proceeded to do just that!  I got a blonde called Trappistes Rochefort which was 9.2% alcohol by volume, and it was just lovely :)  We ended up in this alley that reminded me of Little Italy in NYC, but a cobblestone alley instead of a street.  Tons of restaurants with outdoor seating, which all served similar menus.  The restaurant managers were all outside trying to coax the tourists in, offering deals and such.  This one place offered us an appetizer, entree and dessert for 12 euro, and he said he's throw in free champagne too!  So we're going to dress up tonight and go back there!

For the next three days there is a beer festival going on - perfect - so I imagine we'll spend most of our time there tomorrow, and then walk around for parks and pictures on Saturday.  This place is awesome and I'm totally in love with it.  Highly recommend to anyone and I would come back here in a heartbeat!