So here it finally is, the official Belgium bash III thread! I'm still not entirely happy with the poster but since my knowledge of photoshop is still very rudimentary it was taking forever so this'll do for now. Like last time I'm going to add attending 5punkers to it so if you would like to be in it send me a high resolution picture of yourself/pet/spirit animal and I'll paste you onto one of the hotline miami gangsters. I can put the whole of you in there too if you like but that will take a bit more time. Want to add yourself? No problem, just let me know and I'll send you the files.
WHEN: 23-26 October 2015
WHERE: Ghent
WHAT'S GOING ON:
Friday: Today is your grand arrival! Since everyone is coming here by train at different times, I thought it best if we meet up in the station first and from there I can take you to the boat to drop off your stuff, buy bus tickets etc. I'll be waiting in the starbucks since we don't have a nice coffee shop in there. After everyone arrived and has his stuff secured we can go out for some chips and or drinks.
Saturday: We're going to the lovely animal park Pairi Daiza which despite the dumb name is actually pretty cool. We'll be going there by van, for only €8 PP! The downside is that it's driven by my mum, but sacrifices had to be made. You can have a lunch of your choice in the park and in the evening we'll be going for burgers. How we will fill in the rest of the evening is not yet decided.
IMPORTANT: We need to leave at 8:30 from Ghent. We'll come and pick you up with the van near the boat, I'll tell you where.
Sunday: BBQ and maybe some beardy games. I will try and get us some boardgames too (more on that later), all of this action will be on the boat.
Monday: Fare thee well good friends!
Pairi Daiza
It's always tricky to find something all 5punkers like to do so after the last bash I started thinking about what we could do this time but found it a bit hard. Theme parks are noisy, overcrowded and expensive. City trips are impractical and usually boil down to a walk and a pub crawl. Guided tours are not interesting to everyone and trying to get 5punkers to stay together is... problematic. So ideally we need a place that's relatively calm, offers a variety of food and drink and has something everyone likes. So I had a think and realised there's one thing we so far haven't tried (or not that I'm aware of): a zoo.
A bit of info:
Belgium has a few animal parks but only two of note: The Antwerp zoo, which is Belgium's "official" and oldest zoo, and the relatively young Pairi Daiza, previously called Paradisio but that sounds like a 90's discotheque so maybe it's good that they changed that. The Antwerp zoo is certainly not a bad zoo but it's really just that: a zoo. Pairi Daizi tries to think bigger and is more of a nature park with animals in it. Even when I visited as a kid and it was little more than a bunch of large cages with birds I could see this place had great potential and could probably, given time and funding, out-zoo the Antwerp zoo. Now it finally did just that.
It's set in pretty much the middle of nowhere (seriously, look at it on google maps), is impressively large at 140 acres (which is just about larger than Chester zoo) and has about 4000 animals. This may not seem like a lot but I'm glad it's like this otherwise the poor buggers would live in cramped spaces. It's build on the grounds of an old abbey of which the ruins are still there, and to commemorate the history of the place they started brewing their own abbey beer as well, it's not bad.
There is quite a lot to see so be sure to check out their website for more info but here's some of my favourites:
Part of the old abbey crypt is home to a colony of fruit bats, and unlike other bat exhibits the bats are not behind glass. Standing in a dark crypt whilst chittering bats fly around you makes you feel a bit like batman. It's awesome!
The Chinese and Indonesion gardens: Both are the largest of their kind in Europe (which isn't very hard I'll bet) but what makes them stand out for me is how they spared no expense in making them look authentic, they had craftsmen come over from their respective countries to make it the way their people have been making them for centuries, I was incredibly impressed by this.
The raptor show: Raptor shows are usually a bit dull but if you like big birds this one's not too long and worth seeing.
The elephant baths: Pairi Daiza has three Asian elephants and elephants like to bathe, up to three times a day. They constructed a temple for them and a special bath where you can watch them get washed. That doesn't sound very special but they make a show out of it and you get to touch an elephant. Did you ever touch an elephant? Because now you can.
A house made by Thai craftsmen that is almost entirely emblazoned with carefully carved elephants, lots and lots and lots of elephants. In fact the entire South Asian part is full of elephant things, they even have elephant urinals.
The lemur island: Self explanatory. There is also an island with squirrel monkeys but they steal stuff so be careful, one of them even tried to eat my hat once.
A beautiful collection of parrots: Parrots are great, I will fight you if you claim otherwise.
And many, many more things. Be sure to check out their website linked above and my flickr album to get an idea of the place.
Ticket prices and food:
All this comes at the price of €22 (£15) which admittedly is not very cheap but compared to the Antwerp zoo which costs roughly the same I'd say it's worth it. Be sure to order in advance as to avoid a higher price and to ensure we can get in the park. I'll give you a heads up when I order mine so you don't forget. You can order tickets here.
Food:
The park has the usual disappointing burgers and chips on offer but there are other options for us, there is:
A Chinese buffet: Mrs. J bought me lunch here for my birthday and bizarrely this is the best Chinese buffet I've ever been too, and I've been to a few Chinese buffets. The special dining hall it's in is incredibly beautiful and apparently is constructed without using a single nail but don't let that worry you. It is also more expensive than the usual Chinese buffet at €24,90 (18 whole squids).
Le Moulin: A snackbar that serves things like sandwiches and pancakes, I've not been here yet.
Le Perroquet: A pizza place near the parrots, the pizza is pretty mediocre but it's good enough when you're hungry.
L'Oasis: Another buffet but with more traditional food options like pasta dishes, stews, other... things. It's in the middle of an enormous greenhouse filled with birds so that's a cool thing. I've not been here yet so I can't comment on the quality or price but you pay for the dish you take.
La Brasserie: The other 'proper' restaurant is set in a renovated medieval building and serves traditional Belgian fare that can be washed down with a nice Belgian beer. It's a real restaurant but not unreasonably priced and quite good. FYI: Belgian food is not unlike French food, not particularly refined but it's hearthy and will certainly suit the average British person just fine.
There's a bunch of other small snackbars and eateries scattered around the park but if we want to eat at the Chinese buffet we need to get there on time since it's only open between 11h45 and 14h30.
We can decide there what we eat since I don't think you need to make reservations but let me know what you'd like so that I can do a bit of planning. (pffft)
Accommodation and transport.
Accomodation
Sadly the extra rooms and general luxury we had at previous bashes are not something I can offer this time, since I share a house with others and their rooms are off-limits. What I can offer however is our attic, living room and maybe our little office. The living room has two small-ish leather couches in it that can be slept on and a carpet for those with low needs. The rest is all tiled so I wouldn't recommend it. The attic is a fairly spacious attic which has three couches, one of which is a one-person sleeping couch. There are also two mattresses up there but one of them is a weird foam thing and the other looks like a tramp slept on it so that's at your own risk. Our "office" has a little ikea fold-down couch/seat that probably can be slept on but with a surface area of about 120cmx124cm you might not be entirely comfortable.
I will try and provide as many sleeping bags and inflatable mattresses as I can so that you don't have to drag it all the way here but I'll let you know closer to date how many I've managed to gather.
Needless to say, if you would like some sleeping comfort you're probably better off staying at a hotel in Ghent. There's no recommendation I can give you there but there are loads of hotels, B&B's and hostels so there is a fair bit of choice. My house is about 10 min away from the centre by car or about 25 min by tram, sometimes it's faster but depends on how crowded the centre is. Ghent is a lovely city (the area where I live, not so much) so you're not throwing money away if you want to stay at a hotel or something.
B&B's you can find here: http://www.bedandbreakfast-gent.be/
Everything else: http://www.visitgent.be/en/accommodation or google.
Transport
First of all, here's where I live so you can do your planning accordingly, but never hesitate to ask me about specifics. If you lose your heading on your way here, never hesitate to ask your nearest Belgian, most of us speak decent enough English to help you out.
Trains
If you arrive by airplane or Eurostar you're going to need to take a train to get to Ghent, luckily Belgium is small and it only takes about half an hour to get there. There is a train that goes straight to Ghent from Brussels airport but it takes longer to get here so you're better off taking a train to Brussels-South (Brussel-Zuid/Midi) first, and then connect to a Ghent one. Either way, your station of arrival is called Gent-Sint Pieters and you want to take a train that has an 'IC' prefix (Inter City) since they're faster. You'll notice anyway because IC trains are newer, fancier trains. There is a €7 surcharge when you buy your ticket on the train so be sure to buy it either in the station or online, and ask your airline about the diabolo surcharge when you're flying in because I'm not 100% sure on how it works. I do know it's pretty dumb.
When you come with the Eurostar you already arrive in Brussels-South so it's pretty easy from there. You used to be able to travel to any Belgian station with your eurostar ticket but I don't know if that's still true for UK customers, best to ask them as I can't find it on their website.
Train timetables, tickets etc.: http://www.belgianrail.be/en
Trams
You've made it to Gent St Pieters, congratulations! All that's left for you is to get to my house which is on the other side of town, oh noes! Luckily there is a tram from the station that stops about 100m from my door. LUCKY YOU. Info&tickets here.
Cars
If you decided to brave the French and Belgian traffic you are a true hero of your people, though some might call you foolish. Let me know if you want to come by car so I can ask an actual driver for directions since GPS's always seem to send you through the city centre and you really, really don't want to do that.
