Victor Travel Blog

Bruges has got us to fall in love completely for those two short days we spent there in May last year, so that it became clear enough – we had to come back. But the splendid family Egmond Hotel in old town coasts 115 EUR per day (including amazing breakfast). Is it possible to find anything cheaper? Yes, it’s possible, as it turned out! In this case you should live in a rented accommodation in Bruges, not in a hotel.

We were lucky to see a great variety of such accommodations during our first walks there – from tiny houses to nearly palaces.

Having a little raid in the Internet, my navigator (ma chere) quickly has found the site www.belvilla.com and our future house in Bruges there. If you speak English a little bit (or some of another nine languages presented at the site) and have some credit card – it’s not difficult at all to rent an accommodation for a week. You will have a choice there: to pay for the whole period or make a short prepayment at the beginning and pay the balance in three months.

Here is our Bruges accommodation – small yellow Zoe’s Cottage at Rolweg 37.

The minimum rental period is one week, and then – as you wish and depending on the free dates.

One week costs 470 EUR. It appeared to be much more cheaper than at any other decent hotel in the old part of Bruges. (Later, at parting, the hostess gave me her calling card with her personal e-mail address in the event if I wish to rent this house for the next time. And it seems to me that in this case the cost is going to be even lower).

Upon your arrival the hosts will take a cash deposit from you at the rate of 200 EUR, they will deduct light and gas charges (there is boiler for hot water) out of it and you’ll get the balance back on your account after departure (you should have the details of bank account in order it could be possible to carry out the money transfer). We have paid about 30 EUR for gas and light there for the period of six days.

That is all about financial matters, next goes the sheer romantic.

We were promised to live in antique accommodation – that’s correct, the house appeared to be really age-old. Everything inside looked age-old, but carefully repaired. There were pictures of grandma and grandpa of the present house-owner Fabien on the walls. There was also a gas chimney.

In addition there were all the modern conveniences.

We were promised to have a wonderful view from the window – we got it undoubtedly. Here is a tower of Jerusalem Church. You are sitting on the first floor at a table, drinking your morning coffee and see all THIS!

At night, when you go to bed in your bedroom on the second floor of your house in Bruges, going to sleep after long walk through antique paved streets, all THIS is saying good night to you!

And if you suddenly awake at night you will hear THIS…

It must be said that the concert is going to be continued in the morning.

These songs are singing by the garden of Jerusalem Church, which takes a lot of land behind the stone wall, almost the whole neighborhood, by the way.

And the first thing you see in the morning, just opening your eyes, is…

So, we woke up in the morning, were surprised at this happiness, drank our coffee…

and were ready to continue our walks.

Usually, we went at first to the Queen’s square or to the marketplace of Bruges, there were free Wi-Fi (we did not have Internet at the house), settled down to the bench amid medieval castles, houses and cafes, switched on the Sommy (full name is Samsung Galaxy Tab) and got the e-mails, dealing with urgent business matters for about fifteen minutes.

Then we had free schedule, because the famous film “In Bruges” does not conveys even one-hundredth of the city’s charm. One can simply strolling along the streets of old Bruges, looking at its houses and dreaming to buy some accommodation for making family hotel or café or, there again, renting out.

You want also visit one of two shop of French cheese (both of them are situated at Geldmundstraat within 5-7 minutes of walking from the central square Markt),

to buy new mix of fragrant product for dinner (every day we had new mix),

or visit any local store to buy French wine, green and meat for the dinner as well

or, in case it is Wednesday, one can peep into central square of Bruges, where the farming market is situated, to buy some farm products or foremost window flower. But we are citizen of Bruges only for a week.

Now we can softly carry out the purchases back home – fortunately the old center is not too large, though much more bigger than in Riga, and then we can go for a walk again.

If you prefer traveling by car (you can rent a car right at the Brussels airport – new Citroen C3 in Sixt.com for six days will cost 417,73 EUR with all possible insurances and GPS- navigation)…

the hosts of cottage have their own garage at a short distance away. It costs 50 EUR per week.

Are there any disadvantages of such a rest? Yes, there are.

We were not alone who like thе view from our window, because every hour in the afternoon small and colorful city tourist bus stopped closely by our window, tourists in earphones were listening to some information – it was in complete silence for us, – making some photos of our pretty tower and left in some seconds to continue their way.

Besides, from time to time, some group of tourists hung out by our window for making photos. Sometimes they peeped into our window, where we were decorously tasting wine and cheese, ant they thought, perhaps: real citizens of Bruges are living the good life.

I can’t say, that feeding at home is a disadvantage, because the cuisine in local cafes is not perfect – homemade food is always more better and much more cheaper.

What about Bruges attractions? All right, let’s talk about it in the next story.

More about Bruges:

Stanning Interiors of Bruges Churches
Bruges photos by day and at night