Day 36, 18 July 2014, Antwerp to Ghent on the train, Sightseeing in a Euro Heat Wave - Made it to 36 degrees last time I looked! Firstly, let it be said, Ghent is a picture postcard town. I did a self-guided walking tour and have, quite possibly taken a photo of every picture postcard view there was to see - so today's entry won't be too long - to allow ample photo viewing time. Not unreasonably my room wasn't ready at 10.30 am, so I headed off with map in hand and walked along the canal to the historic centre of Ghent. All of Belgium seems to be a historic centre to my eyes, but Ghent really is the icing on the cake thus far. St Nicholas Church and the Belfry were the first massive edifices on display, St Bavo's Cathedral is completely underwraps right now being restored (saved a photo there). Ghent is wall to wall tourists and locals today because tonight is the opening night of the Ghent Festivities - big stages everywhere, beer halls and bars and tourists, speaking every language under the sun. Carefully watching where I'm going, I head around town eventually moving off the beaten path to the Patershol district - the oldest part of Ghent with a medieval layout, I actually found a bakery doing a coffee and a pastry for only €2.20. I sat on a chair on the sidewalk and exchanged very brief pleasantries with two elderly Dutch gents getting stuck into their first can of beer for the day. Frightfully hot afterall - and they did buy them from the bakery. Gotta love Belgium. Was very impressed by the time I reached the Castle of the Counts. Impressed, but on the verge of heat exhaustion and too miserly to pay €10 to go right inside - happily strolled in the shade of the entrance hall and enjoyed the castle-ness from the outside. Eventually finished the loop of the old city and made it back to my far-too-warm hotel room (repeat after me "We don't need air-conditioning in Europe" - apparently if you say it often enough, the temperature drops. Yeah. Like by winter time.) Spent the afternoon hiding from the heat. Trundled out at 10.30 pm when it got dark and enjoyed the music, lights and fun of the festivities. Very, very, very careful on the way back to the hotel... 1000s of Ghentenars have come to town on their push bikes and I really didn't want to get done over by a D.U.I (Dutch person Under the Influence). Off to Bruges tomorrow. Excited - remember the first time I'd ever heard of Bruges was when James and I went to Colin Farrell's movie "In Bruges" a long, long time ago.