I thought I'd give you a few more glimpses from our travels in the Netherlands and in Belgium. In Tongeren we stayed at Hotel Eburon, a monastery from the 12th century built in the middle of the old, Roman town, now transformed into the most amazing hotel.

The Eburon is a part of the small, Belgian Different Hotels chain. Its origin is still clearly visible in the magnificent corridors but also in the guest rooms. They all have very high ceilings and large double door windows. The colour palette is mainly pink-red-brown-lime (which T. wasn't too thrilled about), but he agreed when I said the design was very well executed. The hotel opened last year and it still feels new. The people who work there are extremely helpful and friendly, the restaurant is really good and the town centre in Tongeren, with its famous Begijnhof, is really cute. Angelic is probably the best description.

We have now returned from a wonderful second summer vacation (we spent a week and a half at my parents where we both had relatives visiting from the U.S. and then T.'s parents, sister and brother-in-law arrived from Denmark). While there we celebrated my birthday and, since I received some money, I decided to use them to buy a new bike. T. and I have been looking around in the last few days and today we decided to order a brand new GT Avalanche 3.0 each. T. said he too needed the exercise. :)

Let's hope we will like the bikes as much as we think and that we will have plenty of opportunities to use them.

We spent a few rainy, but very nice, days (staying at the cozy Hotel Vondel on Vondelstraat) in Amsterdam, walking around in the town centre, crossing canal after canal, hopping on a boat to see the canals from that angle as well, choosing not to go to museums but rather trying to get a feel of what the city was like. We found some culinary golden nuggets too: The first morning we had an amazingly fresh (orange and raspberry juice, a huge ham and cheese sandwich) breakfast at B&B Lunchroom on Leidsestraat. The same evening we had some wonderful, wonderful pasta at small, genuine and friendly Italian La Festa on Hazenstraat in Jordaan and before leaving Amsterdam we had another amazing breakfast (tea, freshly squeezed orange juice, bagel with cream cheese and jam) at Bagels and Beans on Keizersgracht (near Leidseplein), where free Internet access was available. My feet were certainly tired by that time, but we will definitely come back to Amsterdam at some point... let's hope the weather will be a bit better then.

On the way to Germany on Maundy Thursday T. and I decided to go to the small town where he grew up. The weather was absolutely lovely, the trees were in bloom and it was really warm and nice. We had lunch (chicken sandwich for me and a "Mexican" hamburger for T.) sitting outside in the sun for the first time this year, outside one of the restaurants on the main street. We then walked around, saw the 16th century church, the old pharmacy (filled with both Easter decorations and Christmas ones) from 1671 and many other old houses. Afterwards we drove to Germany and bought our favourite chocolate, some wine and whisky (for my brother) and then we spent the evening with T.'s parents. It was a really good day, and a really good beginning on the Easter holiday.

Early tomorrow morning we'll be on the train. The children are on their way to their father and I'm on my way to T. It feels sad not to be able to spend Easter with my sons, but at the same time I know all of us will have a great week. They are looking forward to spending some time there, and I'm looking forward to doing all these everyday things with my partner that we don't have the time to do that often. The suitcases have been packed and we're ready to go. I'd better get some sleep.

Image from Sälen Konferens.

No, it won't happen until summer, but now the hotels have been booked both in Amsterdam and Tongeren and it feels really good. We expect to drive around a bit as well and I'm sure we'll stop by in Antwerpen and other cities. Since the cities are pretty close, I'm sure there will be quite a few chances for seeing many things we haven't even thought of yet.

Images from Anita's Home, Only in Holland, and My Hometown Antwerpen.

When T. and I began discussing possible holiday cities, I suggested Amsterdam pretty early on. I haven't been there in many, many years and thought it might be interesting to go there again. T. then suggested Antwerp or Bruge and our thoughts subsequently turned to Belgium. Today I also looked a bit at Luxemburg. Perhaps a holiday with a few stops actually might be a good idea.

Today, I began searching for hotels and I was lucky to find an entire chain in Belgium that looked really nice. I just can't decide which hotel I like the best. Carbon, above, is situated in the small city of Genk near Maastricht in Belgium, and Eburon can be found in a beautiful, old monastery in a town nearby, Belgium's oldest city Tongeren, with a history that dates back to the Roman Empire. Which one do you like the best?



All images can be found at Different Hotels.

We're usually travelling quite a lot, partly because of work and partly because we live apart. The sad thing about all this is that we seldom have the time to go on these wonderfully romantic long weekend getaways.

In 2007, we spent a few days on our own in Paris, however, and last summer we decided to take my in-laws and sister-in-law and her husband with us to Berlin. We had an absolutely marvellous time. Lately, I've begun to think about where we could go next. Any suggestions?