nitishraj

Hello Friends,

Me and my wife are visiting Belgium, Paris and Amsterdam in November 1st week. We have a conference to attend in Amsterdam.
We start our trip in Ghent and are going to be there for 3 days and will be seeing Brugge, Antwerp and Ghent. Then we have a two day gap..and then we proceed to paris for 2 days and further on to Amsterdam.
Now the help we require is..I had mentioned two day gap...the reason is that typically, we would have had spent the two days in Brussels and then proceeded to Paris...but me and my wife have seen Brussels earlier and would not be Keen on doing it again.
Hence please request suggestions what we can do in those 2 days and proceed to Paris...
As I was typing this, I came across Loire Valley..will it be a good option..

Thanks...
Nitish

PalenQ

You only going to be in Paris for 2 days - if so I'd suggest going early and spending 4 days in Paris -unless you've been there before.

Going by car or train?

Loire Valley is a few hours south of Paris - not on the way. Can do a day trip there from Paris by train and then mini-bus tours to a few biggie chateaus

Assume you going by train - check www.seat61.com for lots of info on discounted tickets for Paris and Paris-Amsterdam on Thalys trains (www.thalys.com) - www.seat61.com great resource on booking your own online; www.budgeteuropetravel.com and www.ricksteves.com also great train resources and where to go by them.

Not much of exceptional interest to average tourist Brussels-Paris by train - with car Reims and Champagne tours would be nice.

PalenQ

When are you going? - makes a difference for place like Loire Valley.

Whathello

Bxl then paris then Amsterdam is not very logic.
Do bxl Amsterdam then paris.
And add the 2 days in paris.
Or go to Dinant or bouillon or mons or tournai or la vallée de la no lignée ... you don't visit Belgium you limit yourself to Flanders which is half of Belgium.

Sassafrass

Spend the extra days in Paris. Big, beautiful city, lots to do and see.

StCirq

Spendthe extra days in Paris.

It's "my wife and I," not "me and my wife." Sorry, but this drives me crazy. If you have a conference to attend, presumably you need to sound reasonably professional and literate. Rant over.

Whathello

St Cirq
Moi et ma femme.... I read it more in English than in French.

Tulips

Is this 3 full days in Belgium or 3 nights? You could add Ieper, Flanders Fields museum.
If you haven't been to Paris I would add the days to Paris.

Just fyi, November 1 is a holiday in Belgium. Shops may be closed (probably not in Brugge as it's geared towards tourists). Check opening hours of sites for that day.

PalenQ

What would St-Cirq do with critiquing whathello's English?

bilboburgler

Reims or Epernay beckon for the odd champagne. Or pop down to Alsace for some of the world's best white wines.

PalenQ

both Reims and Alsace are rather hard to get to by train from Belgium - Reims via Paris and back out - better to do as a day trip from Paris - Alsace take much of a day to get there from Brussels and back to Paris.

2 days ain't much.

lavandula

Between Paris and all the stops you have in Flanders you might think of Lille or Arras. I particularly like Lille, but not sure what you might do there as I have only ever been on unplanned stops by car.

Lavandula

bilboburgler

Don't see if the OP is using a train or a car.

StC, I got shot for that three years ago, I still carry the scars ;-)

Much of a day Brussels to Alsace, well it is a wee way but not 8 hours (well not every time I do it)

nitishraj

Dear All, Thank you so so much for all the advice and suggestions..
Thanks PalenQ, bilboburgler, lavandula, whathello, sassafrass, stcirq and Tulips. all these definitely help us to plan our trip better
Tulips, thank you specially for letting us know that Nov 1st is a Holiday...very helpful to know...

we now need to figure out if Brugge will be open on 1st as this would shake our plans a bit.
we are in Flanders on 30th second half, 31st, 1st & 2nd...and had planned to do 30th & 31st - Ghent, 1st Brugge and 2nd Antwerp...keeping Ghent as the base on all the 4 nights.

lavandula

If Ghent is your base it might be handy to know that the main train station, Gent St Peters, is a half-hour walk from the town. There is a tram which will cut the time down by half and will cost you EUR3. You can stay close to the station as there are hotels there, but would still be going into town for sightseeing, restaurants. There are actually 2 main stations, Gent Dampoort, which is for trains to Antwerpen, and Gent St Pieters, which is all other trains.

Lavandula

PalenQ

are actually 2 main stations, Gent Dampoort, which is for trains to Antwerpen, and Gent St Pieters, which is all other trains.>

But Antwerp trains also go from St Peters - don't all trains serve both stations?

lavandula

If going to Antwerpen from Gent-St Pieters you frequently have to change trains at Gent-Dampoort. There are some trains where you don't have to change. Sorry if I was misleading, my bad. The line from Gent-Dampoort does go to Antwerpen. Check it out on the Belgian Rail website:

www.b-rail.be
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belgian_railway_line_59

Lavandula