Steve and Cathy's Blog

Our ship arrives at 6:30am to this phenomenally busy seaport. Steve is aghast at the amount of freight activity and, if he had his druthers, would have opted for an all-day tour of this port over practically anything. Right across from our ship is the “roro” ship (roll on-roll off ship that is loaded and unloaded using tractors pulling trailers and containers are moved on specially-built dollies rather than handled by crane) Yasmine. It’s actually a ferry that is loaded and unloaded from the bow, which opens up on to a pier. It reminds him of a circus-clown car, with tractor-trailer after container after trailer after double-stacked containers on dollies are being pulled out of it – seemingly endlessly.

At another dock is her sister ship arriving and unloading. There are car carriers – the port of Zeebrugge is the world’s largest port for imports and exports of new vehicles. Liquified Natural Gas tankers unload gas from the nearby North Sea fields at this port. The activity is incredible, and Steve is in “freight heaven.”

But, alas, this is not why we are here. Our excursion today is entitled Panoramic Ghent by Canal Boat. It begins at 9:45 and will last for five hours. We board our bus on time and meet our guide Mark and our driver Frederick. It’s a 59-mile journey through the flat countryside (we see why Belgium is referred to as one of the Low Countries) as Mark fills us with introductory information, which we will put in bullet points:

• Belgium is divided by language and custom. Wikipedia describes it thusly: “Belgium is a sovereign state and a federal constitutional monarchy with a parliamentary system. Its institutional organization is complex and is structured on both regional and linguistic grounds. It is divided into three highly autonomous regions: the Flemish Region (Flanders) in the north, the Walloon Region (Wallonia) in the south, and the Brussels-Capital Region. Brussels is the smallest and most densely populated region, as well as the richest region in terms of GDP per capita.

• “Belgium is home to two main linguistic communities: the Dutch-speaking Flemish Community, which constitutes about 60 percent of the population, and the French-speaking Community, which constitutes about 40 percent of the population. A small German-speaking Community, numbering around one percent, exists in the East Cantons. The Brussels-Capital Region is officially bilingual in French and Dutch, although French is the dominant language. Belgium’s linguistic diversity and related political conflicts are reflected in its complex system of governance, made up of six different governments.”

• Our guide mentions that the country is importing thousands of EV automobiles, which all well and good, but the country does not have the electric supply to power them all. This is eventually going to become a big problem.
• The Romans ruled the area from 56 to around 500, but Germanic tribes from the east migrated to the area around the year 400.
• The landscape is flat, and you can see many of the trees are bent slightly due to the west wind.
• Belgium only achieved independence (from the Netherlands) in 1831.
• In World War I, the Western Front was in western Belgium. In WWII, it was occupied by the Germans from 1940 until the Canadian armed forces liberated the country in February of 1945.
• The country is too small to be agriculturally independent, but one important crop is potatoes, grown primarily for export.
• Belgium is famous for heart surgery.
• We pass near several small towns, and each one has a belfry. Our guide says that the belfry is a symbol of freedom for Belgians and almost every Flemish village has one.
• Amusingly, our guide tells us that “Belgians are born with a brick in their stomach.” By that he means that private houses are important to people in this country – much more so than in neighboring France. He refers to them as villas, which confuses us at first.
• He mentions highway E40, which is probably the most important road in Europe. It begins in Calais, France and runs all the way to Russia and beyond. It is the major truck route to Germany. We are traveling on it today. Our guide says that many of the drivers are from eastern European countries.
• Gasoline is 1.90 Euros per liter. This converts to $7.18 at today’s exchange rate. Diesel is 1.80 Euros/liter. 
• Education in Belgium: 2 ½ years free preschool until 6; free public school through high school until age 18.
• Both parents must work due to high cost of living, and that leads to a high divorce rate.
• From our guide: “When we vacation, we go to France, even though we don’t like them much. For warm weather, we go to Spain. We don’t go to Britain much since Brexit. We go to Germany for history.”
• Ghent has a population of 260,000 people.
• Ghent University is here, of course. As one of Belgium’s most famous, it has been ranked as one of the world’s top 150, according to QS World University Rankings.

We arrive in Ghent and begin our tour with a walk, as our guide continues offering commentary:

• Many churches in Belgium named St. Nicholas because he is the patron saint of sailors.
• Many of the castles left in Ghent are in very good shape because there was a World Exposition here in 1913, when many of them were heavily renovated.
• “When I was to the United States to visit, I was surprised to see people eating corn on the cob. Here, corn is only for cattle!”
• There are various rowing competitions on the canals in Ghent.

Our guide takes us by the three most famous buildings in Ghent’s center: Saint Nicholas Church, Saint Bavo Cathedral, and the Belfry of Ghent. He quips that there is no spire on St. Nicholas Church “Because the brewers ran out of money.” Wikipedia provides this information: “St. Nicholas Church (Dutch: Sint-Niklaaskerk) is one of the oldest and most prominent landmarks in Ghent, Belgium. Begun in the early 13th century as a replacement for an earlier Romanesque church, construction continued through the rest of the century in the local Scheldt Gothic style (named after the nearby river). Typical of this style is the use of blue-gray stone from the Tournaiarea, the single large tower above the crossing, and the slender turrets at the building’s corners.

“Built in the old trade center of Ghent next to the bustling Korenmarkt (Wheat Market), St. Nicholas Church was popular with the guilds whose members carried out their business nearby. The guilds had their own chapels which were added to the sides of the church in the 14th and 15th centuries.

“The central tower, which was funded in part by the city, served as an observation post and carried the town bells until the neighboring belfry of Ghent was built. These two towers, along with the Saint Bavo Cathedral, still define the famous medieval skyline of the city center. One of the treasures of the church is its organ, produced by the famous French organ builder Aristide Cavaillé-Coll.”

After a quick bathroom break (the restrooms are very clean and graffiti-free!), we walk to Ghent City Center, a picture of which begins this post.

Everyone boards this open-air boat, including our guide. We meet the boat’s captain and guide, whose name is Stephan (our spelling is probably incorrect, but his name is pronounced Stef’ on). He has been a canal boat guide for nine years, and his education included a great deal of history, which is perfect for touring a city with so much of it. He is delightful and entertaining, just like our other guide Mark. He explains that the tour will be in two parts. Between the two, we will disembark and have lunch, after which we will join him for the second half, which he tells us is in the older part of the canal system.

As we sail along, Stephan pilots the boat, talks to all of us on a microphone, and converses with the passengers in the bow.

He points out various structures, takes us through canals large and small, and gives us more interesting information, stories and history that we can ever absorb. And, truth be told, we have no idea what some of the buildings are whose photos we are posting, and are doing so to give a general picture of the city’s architecture. 

Here are some of the random facts and info we did write down:

• The city started as a settlement at the confluence of the River Scheldt and the River Leie as early as the Iron Age, and by the Late Middle Ages, had grown to a city of 50,000. 
• Most historians believe that the older name for Ghent, ‘Ganda’, is derived from the Celtic word ganda, which means confluence.
• We went by an old, old stone warehouse building. At first, grain had been stored there on all floors, but they had to move to using only the third and fourth floors to keep rats away. Apparently, Ghent was a grain harbor in the 11^th century as well, with the city government confiscating a quarter of it as a tax.

• The city flourished during the Middle Ages, especially in the 14^th century, when it was bigger than Amsterdam with a population of 60,000. 
• The annual; Ghent Festival (Gentse Feesten) in 2022 drew 1.6 million people. It takes place for ten days each July.
• Ghent has always been an industrial center, and there is still considerable manufacturing. In the 18^th and 19^th century, it was an enormous textile center, and some of these buildings remain.

• Right now, as in most of northern Europe’s rivers and canals, the water level is low.
• We motor past a large cannon in a small park. It has never been fired, and is a symbol of peace for the city. It is called Dulle Griet (“Mad Meg”, named after the Flemish folklore figure Dull Gret).

• We pass by a statue of a boy peeing. Apparently, leather manufacturers way back when needed urine for tanning, and the kids got paid for it.
• Note: drinking beer out of the wrong type of glass is considered a bad thing in Belgium.
• We travel past the Gravensteen, Dutch for Castle of the Counts. Essentially built around 1180, over the centuries, it fell into ruinous condition. Parts of it were purchased by the City of Ghent, and was substantially rebuilt in time for the 1913 World Exposition. Students took over the castle in 1949 to protest beer price increases. This event is reenacted annually.

• Symbols of the city are a noose and hangman, a symbol of stubbornness and resistance.
• The canals running off of the two rivers are only one meter deep, and thus need to be cleaned annually. The river and canals in Ghent are opened up to allow water to flood into them for a week each November. 
• Stephan tells us a great story about the Marriott Hotel that is near the dock in the city center. The building has sculptures of two swans that look at each other, supposedly locked in eternal love. That’s what the folks at Marriott were told. But the history is quite a different story, and the swans actually look away from each other. Apparently, the swans actually represented a brothel. Between the two halves of our tour, we had time to sit in the city center and listen to all the guides on the tour boats. As each boat passed the hotel, this story was told, much to the delight of the passengers.

• Toward the end of the canal boat tour, Stephan takes us past two apartment buildings on opposite sides of the canal. On one side is a sculpture of a woman diving off of a balcony. On the opposite side, a man is doing the same. Very fun.

• As we board the canal boat for the second half of our tour, we take a photo of our bus guide Mark. A very jolly person and a great guide.

We will now post photos of Ghent – some of them of buildings we can’t identify at this point – that will provide an overview of this very historical city.

We leave around 2pm for the trip back to the ship. We thoroughly enjoyed our visit to Ghent. Our guides were great; the weather was perfect, and the city fascinating. Obviously, as happened the previous day, we only got a brief look at this city. It certainly would be worth a much, much longer visit.

Alas, that will have to wait. We arrive back at Sirena at 3pm. For the next 90 minutes, Steve watches the shipping activity taking place right near our ship. Another enormous ferry is unloading its cargo, and yet another one is being led by tow tugs deeper into the harbor for unloading. Incredible.

We watch the ultra-luxury cruise ship Seabourn Ovation leave port, and we follow her promptly at 4:30pm. We have a 216-nautical-mile journey to Honfleur, France. We anticipate that tomorrow will be a special day, because we will tour the area where the D-Day battle took place, as well as one of the American cemeteries.