This year for Christmas we headed over to Belgium. We took the Eurostar to Brussels and then another train onto Bruges to arrive around 2pm Christmas Eve. We walk into the middle of Bruges and had a big lunch of mussels, fries and beers before having a bit of a walk around. It turns out a lot of the tourist sites (including the Christmas markets) close early on Christmas Eve so we didn't actually get to go up the Bell tower. So instead we had a look at some of the many chocolate shops around town and downed a few more beers. We then went on an 'In Bruges' walking tour which was good but went a bit long so we had to finish it early in order to eat prior to everything closing early on Christmas Eve. We woke on Christmas day and had a glass of champagne we picked up the day before and traded Christmas presents. We were then planning on going for an ice-skate but unfortunately somebody must of have too many Belgian beers the night before as one of the volunteers there told us he had been ringing around all the other volunteers to see who was meant to be opening up but they weren't answering. So instead we had a bit of a further walk around Bruges before heading back to our hostel where we had a 10 euro Christmas lunch. The lunch was pretty impressive with lots of veg, three types of meat and gravy. We then went and visited the Madonna with Child by Michelangelo and the Basilica of the Holy Blood of Christ before having a few more beers and grabbing some food from the stalls at the Christmas market. We were then feeling the effects of the Belgian beers so headed to bed after a pretty different Christmas. The next day we took the train to Ghent where we spent the day exploring the city. We went for a boat tour, climbed up the bell tower and visited a few churches before jumping on another train to Brussels. We had a walk around Brussels at night and visited the pissing boy, the Grand Place and the Christmas markets. The next day we went for a walk around the city before going ice-skating at the Christmas market. We then visited the Cantillion Brewery which is a small boutique brewery where we got to see how they make their beer. This was very authentic, interesting and a real highlight. It was then back to London which we only just managed to do after I got our train departure time wrong!