BELGIUM BEER IN ANTWERP

Antwerp

• Has a population of 536,079, with the largest metropolitan area of 1.2 million people, next to Brussels in size.
• The port is second to Rotterdam in Europe.
• Hosted the Summer Olympics in 1920.
• First settlement soon after the Year zero,
• Was once the sugar capital of Europe, importing the raw commodity from Portuguese and Spanish plantations on  both sides of the Atlantic when slavery was in fashion.
• Soon thereafter in the 1500's became the richest city in Europe.
• The Reformation religious revolution erupted in Antwerp with violent riots in 1566.
• Suffered during World War II.
• Starting in the 1990s rebranded itself as a world-class fashion center emphasizing  avant-garde clothes.

So I joined the beer tour.

• Belgian pale ale is the pride of Antwerp.  Gained fame in the Liege exposition of 1905.
• Best known is De Koninck.

As expected, was led by my Blue-bar Pigeon.

Another kind of bird.

The Cathedral of Our Lady (Antwerp) began construction on 1521, and at a certain stage, was the largest in the world.  But as much as this building is continuing to build and is not yet completed, it is now #14.  The largest is St. Peters Basilica in the Vatican City,

That lady with the hat is alive,.

Our first beer stop.

Bolleke at 5.6% is the most popular beer in Belgium.

Many locations provide water for dogs.  We entered this bar as our second stop.

Our second beer was a dark at 8% alcohol.  The standard beer is 5%.

Our final beer stop looked like it was inside a church.

We had cherry beer, which was awful.  Like cough medicine and club soda.

A few more photos of Antwerp.

Finally, back to the MS Espirit.

Evening cocktails started, again, with Glenfiddich on rocks.

On to dinner, with Mx. Hsu showing the wines of the evening.

Ordered slicd garlic and hot pepers as preludes to our meal.

Crabcake.

Rack of lamb on top of a Caesar Salad.

Blue cheese and Port wine.

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