Europe Trip - Brussels, Belgium

We flew to Brussels on May 12th early in the morning, but mind you we have been up practically a day and a half already so we were pretty tired, but we still had the rest of the day to look forward to so we didn't waste it by sleeping at our hotel although that would of been nice. We met up one of Gary's co-workers Andrea and from the airport we took a taxi to our hotel. Our taxi driver was absolutely crazy I swear he must of been driving like 70 miles an hour on the side roads and even faster on the highways. Gary was pretty calm for the whole ride which surprised me since he usually would of been panic, but I guess sitting in the back seat and talking to his co-worker distracted him. I was terrified! When we arrived at the hotel even though we were way to early to check in, they let up dropped off our bags so we could walk around the city and see all the beautiful sites.

La-Grand Place - Originally built in the 14th century! Amazing!

Standing in front of the Town Hall

Guild Houses

Gardens

City Life

Beautiful Architecture

Place Du Petit Sablon

Notre Dame du Sablon

The St. Hubert Gallery

Random side street

Royal Palace

Royal Palace Park

Belgium Waffle! Yum!

While we were traveling around we went in search for the U.S. embassy so we could meet up with Gary's contact Russel who is the APHIS attaché to the US ambassador to Belgium. Before we got there though it started to pour on us and we had no umbrella so we ran as quick as we could so we could get out of the rain. We were soaked by the time we found it and went into the right building. When we finally met up with Russell we met with the people in the same department which wasn't very many so it didn't take long at all. Russell invited us into his office were they chatted for a good long time while I was trying to stay awake. Russell was nice and helped us find accommodations for our stay in Holland which was really nice. Eventually he took us out to lunch at an Italian place close by. We all had a nice pasta dish which was good, but all I really wanted to do was take a nap. After lunch we went back to his office and he helped us exchange the money that APHIS gave him. We left shortly after that so we could go back to our hotel and rest. Our room was small and the bed was stiff, but I fell asleep as soon as I laid down. We both slept for 3 hours and then we woke up and got dress to go to a dinner that Gary and I were invited to with all of the speakers for the presentation tomorrow. It was very interesting meeting people from literally all over the world. One guy in particular that I really liked was an Irish guy name Eoin O'Driscol. He worked really hard to get Gary to come out and speak about the Lacey Act for a long time and even at the end it wasn't looking to good so they were all joking about it. It was kind of funny Gary didn't know what he was ordering so he ended up ordering raw fish which he wasn't sure about at first, but he ate it. I was impressed. I would not of eaten it. By the time we left the dinner it was late and Gary made me walk all the way back in my high heels which I was NOT happy about. Walking normally in heels is bad enough, but walking on cobblestones in high heels is a killer and I was in so much pain by the end. As we were going to the dinner we walked as well until we found out that we would be late so we took a cab the rest of the way. Anyway, I was so glad to get back to our hotel and be able to sleep.

Overall, we had a great time in Brussels.

Next stop Amsterdam!