The Colourful World of Mondo Hotels in Belgium

Many hotels these days look the same. Don´t get me wrong, I like minimalist chic but sometimes it is fun to have a little colour around. People who stay in hotels frequently sometimes forget their room number, the name of the hotel or even the city they are staying in! One hotel room looks just like the next.

If you would like to stay somewhere a little different, then I suggest you look at Mondo Hotels. They are a privately-owned group of four hotels in Brussels, Antwerp and Ostend in Belgium.

I love all three cities. Quirky Brussels with its Mannekin Pis statue, the most beautiful square in the world, the Grand Place/Grote Markt, the Tintin museum, great shopping and some wonderful old bars where you can relax and enjoy Brussels beers eg Gueuze, Faro, Lambic and Framboise. Of all the 500 odd beers produced in Belgium, these four are some of my favourites. In fact, there are several varieties of Gueuze. More info on my Squidoo site.

Antwerp has its fantastic harbor with bars lining the old quaysides, or Kaai in Dutch, the new MAS – Museum Aan de Stroom overlooking the inner harbour, even better shopping and unbeatable nightlife.

Ostend (Oostende) is loved by Brits and it is easy to see why. A beautiful golden sandy beach, go karts of every sort to hire, a fresh fish market and stalls selling small platters of seafood, some expensive gin palace boats to drool over in the Mercator yacht harbor, more great shops and a never-ending choice of restaurants. That is if you are not full from all the delicious seafood on the harbour front. Of course, there are plenty of bars for enjoying Belgian beers. I spent four nights in Ostend in August on our own boat and did not want to leave. The luxury residential cruise ship “The World” also visited for two nights whilst we were there.

Mondo Hotels offer a colourful location in each of these three cities so whether you are visiting on business, a one night stop-over or want to make a weekend city break, I recommend Mondo Hotels.

Have a look at Mondo Hotels

Mondo Leopold Brussels is near the European Commission & Parliament but also within walking distance of the Royal Palace, the museums and the Grand Place/Grote Markt.



Mondo Eden Antwerp near the sublimely beautiful Centraal Station which is next door to the Zoo.




Or Mondo Empire Antwerp in the middle of the famous Diamond district.







Mondo Hotel Ostend is a hip and trendy art deco hotel near the seafront, Casino, shops and the beach.





Learn all about Gueuze beers.

Read about my visit to the MAS-Museum Aan de Stroom in Antwerp.

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Visit Brussels in May

With its brace of bank holidays May is the ideal month to get away for a little city break, or maybe even use those well deserved days off to extend a longer holiday. And with the weather likely to hold up far better than at home, Paris, Brussels and Lille are ideal destinations for your early summer sejourn. As well as all the usual tourist attractions, there are plenty of special events and festivals happening throughout May, so read on to find out some amazing attractions.

You can travel to Brussels on Eurostar from just £59 return:


Short cinematography

Head to Brussels before 10 May and you can catch the end of their Festival of Short Films. Held in the Cinema Vendôme in Ixelles, the festival presents an intriguing, snappy selection of short films from all over the world and is ideal for any film fans with short attention spans.

Jazz Festivals
May certainly seems to be the month for all that jazz. In Brussels, there is the Jazz Marathon from 29-31 May, a huge jazz party which will have the city hopping and be-bopping for one weekend. More than 450 musicians will perform in the city’s main squares (Grand Place, Place du Grand Sablon, Place Ste-Catherine and Place Fernand Cocq) as well as in 50 venues, clubs and hotels.

Celebrate Diversity
If you happen to be around on 16 May in Brussels, keep an eye out for the annual Brussels Gay Pride parade. It’s pretty hard to miss. The floats will leave from Boulevard Anspach, between the Bourse and Place Fontainas (in the direction of Gare du Midi), starting at 14.00 for an entertaining and colourful parade which winds its way through the streets of the centre of Brussels to the sound of music.

Whatever your reason for travelling to Brussels, nothing beats simply sitting on the Grand Place or Grote Markt enjoying a Belgian beer.

I also recommend a visit to the quirky Theatre Toone to see a performance of the wonderful wooden puppets. You can find their programme at www.Toone.be





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Eurostar Special Offer for January 2009

Everyone's feeling the credit crunch but Eurostar don't want you to have a miserable January so they are offering 200,000 seats to Paris or Brussels for an incredible £59 return.


So, buck the “bah humbug” habit and book one of 200,000 seats at £59 for a January jaunt to the Continent. Eurostar also offer some great package prices including hotels. The site has some great suggestions of what to do once you arrive. Remember that a return ticket to Brussels includes onward travel to any Belgian rail station. Gift vouchers are also available. I wish someone would buy me some!

Belgium - Week of Taste 2007

The 2nd Week van de Smaak (Week of Taste) will run in Flanders and Brussels from 15-24 November 2007. This is a Flemish festival dedicated to gastronomy - well eating and drinking in general with more than 700 organisers of more than 1,200 events. The Belgians love eating and drinking but don't boast as much about their own recipes as some other cuisines.



There are tastings of world cuisines such as Italian, African, Turkish food - not forgetting streekproducten from the different areas in Belgium, demonstrations in hotel and catering schools, masterchefs, events in breweries, wine tastings, cookery classes including some for children, talks on typical foods, guided tours and various other events.

Here are some unusual items I spotted:
* "De Vijf Smaken op Zijn Brussels", a discovery of Brussels cuisine meeting at Sint Katelijneplein at 14.00 on 17 November.
* "Niet Elke Pater is een Trappist" discussing the differences between Trappist and Abbey beers, Brussels on 14 November, beers tasting included in the 10 €.
* How about a talk on sprouts (spruitsjes)?
* The Dag van de Geuze will be given by De Lambikstoempers in Halle, Vlaams Brabant on 24 November.
* Ecological cooking with pumpkin, Kortenberg on 16 November.
* Spanish tapas and sherries, Everberg on 17 November.
* Spices and drinks in the Middle Ages, Overwinden on 25 November.
* Blindfold dinner, Leuven on 20 November.
* Marzepan, talk at the Suikermuseum in Tienen.
* International pancakes workshop in Antwerp throughout the festival.
* Reading of Poetry about food, Antwerp on 18 November.
* A meal from the time of Keizer Karel in the 16th century, Rijmenam on 21 November.
* Belgian beers tasting, Hemiksem on 21 November.
* Pizzas cookery class for children, Putte on 21 November.
* Tea and coffee tastings in Turnhout.
* Children cooking with syrup, Borgloon on 21 November.
* Nostalgic cookery class, Bree on 22 November.
* Bangladesh cuisine tasting, Genk on 17 November.

A Dutch language class in Brussels will offer typical dishes from their homelands with explanation. There are a couple of film events about chocolate.

Some mayors are doing their bit by cooking for the public such as in Laakdal on the 18th when the mayor will be cooking spaghetti; in Genk, pasta on the 23rd and on the 18th, the mayor of Kalmthout will cook Italian fish soup.

The Flemish bookshop Standard Boekhandel are running a free tasting of Jenever all day on Saturday 17 November in all their shops. Throughout the festival they will display tasting tabels with gastronomy books at special low prices. Marc Joye's book "Feestelijk met Bier" is available for just 5 Euros with a coupon in the brochure. The coupon also gives a discount on cooks about vegetables, desserts and wine.

Some Spar supermarkets will have cookery demonstrations and tastings.


A special feature this year is EETiKET, about children (aged 6-12)and restaurant culture. The idea is that children should enjoy going out to eat and be welcome in restaurants. More than 90 children-friendly restaurants in the brochure welcome children and a section of the website is aimed at schools.

Looking ahead, the lovely town of Lier south of Antwerp will be bidding for the title "Stad van de Smaak 2008" with Oma's smikkelport, a turn of century menu, local products on the Zimmerplein (don't miss the Zimmer Tower), wine tastings, a culinary quiz, Moroccan pizzas, Portuguese specialities and more. Kortrijk hold the title in 2007.

A Free brochure is available in public libraries, Standard Boekhandel and Spar supermarkets with activities divided into provinces and listed under town names. You can also find details on the website.

Click here for info

Echt lekker!

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Leonardo Da Vinci Exhibition in Brussels

We visited the Leonardo Da Vinci exhibition on view at the Basilica Koekelberg in Brussels. This is one of the most complete exhibitions ever on one of the greatest thinkers of the Renaissance, Leonardo da Vinci .

The exhibition, Leonardo - The European Genius, will run until 15 March 2008 at the Koekelberg Basilica, the fifth largest church in the world and the largest Art Deco building ever constructed.

It is presented in four separate themes:
– Leonardo the man from Tuscany to the Loire Valley
- Leonardo the artist with sketches, paintings, sculptures
- Leonardo the engineer with reconstructions including machines and bridges
- Leonardo the humanist with his mysterious reversed writing and collection of codices by the master.

As such, the exhibition presents all the different aspects of his work and the legacy that he left behind to Renaissance art and science, through to the modern day.

There are original works including the Codex of the Flight of Birds and Leonardo's only self portrait, many of which have been lent by major museums worldwide. Obviously, the Mona Lisa "La Giconda" is too fragile and valuable to be lent. The original "Last Supper" is a fresco in Santa Maria delle Grazie in Milan but the copy in Belgium's Tongerlo copy is apparently so faithful to the original, that it was used as a model for renovation of the original. Interest in the Last Supper has been heightened by the novel "The Da Vinci Code" and reference is made to this and the possible significance of Mary Magdalene. The semi-nude portrait of Mary Magdalene holding a veil over her bare breasts had been unseen for fifty years when it was found five years ago in a private Swiss collection. It had previously been attributed to Da Vinci's pupil Giampetrino.

Leonardo (1452-1519) was also a famous engineer and the exhibition shows 45 working models based on the master's designs and all built to scale, including a parachute, helicopter, sailplane, automobile carriage, floating bridge, a double-hulled boat and a 20 metre swing bridge that has never before been built. My children loved seeing these models and wanted to borrow a book about Leonardo's inventions from the library.

This exhibition is spread over 3,000m² so there is plenty to see, interspersed with short videos which set the scene of the various locations in Leonardo's life. Over 100 original works from other artists are also displayed giving context to themes and subjects including Raphael, Michelangelo, Canaletto, Albrecht Dürer and Hieronymus Bosch.

An interesting fact is that Leonardo was left-handed and developed backwards mirror writing so that he did not smudge the ink. Many facsimile copies of his original notebooks are on show.


I most enjoyed the section on the Vitruvian Man. Leonardo (1492) based this on studies made earlier in the 1st Century calculating the exact proportions of every part of a man's body to another. Extremely detailed measurements and calculations were made of this average sized man.

Leonardo -The European Genius site is www.expo-davinci.eu
Entrance price: 10,00 € adults, 8,50 € 6-18 years, Free 0-6 years
Walkman audio guide available in choice of four languages: 2,50 € (recommended)

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Magical Christmas Markets in Belgium

It is cold this weekend so time to think of warm cheer and the enjoyment of a Belgian Christmas market. St Nicholas (Sint Niklaas) arrives on 6 December to visit good children. Shops abound with yummy treats such as marzipan, flat hard cakes known as ‘klaasjes’ and ‘speculoos’, a hard gingerbread molded in the form of St. Nicholas.

Christmas markets are an old holiday tradition in Belgium where both locals and visitors can shop for original and traditional decorations along with other Christmas goodies at open-air stalls in the heart of the city.

Many towns and villages throughout Belgium hold Christmas markets. Most will be aglow with colorful illuminations around their main streets and shopping centers.

In all major cities, shopping will be possible on the four Sundays preceding the holiday. The local Tourist Offices can provide visitors with details on the numerous nativity scenes on display, Christmas markets, concerts and other seasonal events.

Brussels will hold its annual European Christmas market on the Place St. Catherine, from 1 December to 1 January. (M-F: 11-20h & Sat/Sun: 11-22h)

An array of products will be available in a warm and friendly atmosphere. This market with its cheerful lights, delicious aromas and a vast number of stalls promises a true holiday atmosphere. In addition to the Christmas Market the Brussels ice skating rink offers fun for all. This year for the first time a separate small skating rink invites toddlers to enjoy this wonderful winter sport too. And the holiday atmosphere would not be complete without a visit to the Grand’Place decorated in festive lights for the occasion. For more information: www.plaisirsdhiver.be

Antwerp – 7 December to 6 January

Bruges 24 November to 6 January Christmas Market in the historical center of the city, also on the UNESCO World Heritage list.

Gent – 7 to 24 December

Ieper – 30 November to 26 December

Leuven – 12 to 16 December

Liege - 155 decorated wooden cottages form a magical Christmas Village throughout December. Details 011-324/254 9797. The East Cantons is an area to spend a few hours. Don’t miss the opportunity to attend a Christmas concert given by regional choirs and musical societies during the period of Advent, when the Christmas lights appear! Tourism Office of the East Cantons at Tel: 011/328022.

Mechelen – 14 to 16 December

Ostend 30 November to 24 December, Christmas market with ice rink – 8 December to 6 January

For various ways to travel to Belgium, visit EuroTravel

Travel by Eurostar to Belgium

Not only does the comfortable Eurostar take you from the heart of London to the heart of Brussels in just 2 hrs 20 mins but your ticket includes onward travel to anwhere in Belgium. So, how about

- diamond shopping in Antwerp
- visiting historic, beautiful Bruges
- kayaking on the River Lesse in the Ardennes

or just settle down to a delicious gastronomic meal and sample 1 or more of over 400 beers.

London to Brussels in just 2 hrs 20 mins

Brussels is the home or more Michelin-starred restaurants per capita than any other city in Europe.

Book your European travel through Eurotravel.