Beautiful Brussels!

The skies are blue, the weather warm, and we headed to Brussels for the day. Could it get any better than this? Probably not. We went with friends to visit Mini Europe, and got a bonus! Look what we parked right beside...it's the Atomium! The Atomium was created for the 1958 World's Fair in Brussels. It symbolizes an iron crystal, magnified 165 billion times. Each sphere is 18 meters in diameter, and the structure is 102 meters tall. It wasn't designed to survive beyond the World's Fair, but it was so popular that they kept it. We are very glad they did. It's amazing! Our destination wasn't the Atomium, though. It was actually mini Europe. It's a park that has miniatures of all of the famous structures in Europe. The detail in these models is amazing! Pictures can't do it justice. It also has a lot of moving parts. The boats motor by, the trucks drive down the roads, the trains shoot through tunnels and over bridges. It's so much fun to watch! On the left is the Grand Palace in Brussels. This is a model of Nyhavn (New Haven) in Copenhagen. This model is of the British Houses of Parliament in London, England. Big Bend is on the end, and it really chimes every 15 minutes. I bet you thought you were really at the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France. The model is on a scale of 1/25, and it stands 13 meters high. This model is of the Cathedral of Santiago De Compostela in Spain. While we were touring Mini Europe, we noticed that there was some action going on over at the Atomium. They had a little ride called "The Death Drop" going on. Yes, the name alone makes it very tempting, but we refrained from trying it. You take the elevator to the top of the Atomium, go up onto the top of that sphere, and get hooked into a harness. They then attach you to a rope that is connected to the top of the sphere on one end, and a large truck on the other. Then you jump off, sliding quickly down the rope to the ground below. We couldn't decide if these people were really brave or really stupid! This is zoomed in. Here they are on the top of the highest sphere getting strapped in. I am voting for really stupid. After we toured Mini Europe, we decided to go up into the top of the Atomium. We rode an elevator up through the center tube. Out this window, you can see the ropes that those insane people were sliding down. (Notice how far down it really is. Why on earth would you jump off of this???)You can now see how huge Brussels is. I had no idea how large the city is. We will have to come back another day to explore it more. This is Mini Europe, looking even more mini from this view!

To get to the exhibits in the middle spheres, you take the elevator back down to the bottom and then go up one of the tubes on the escalator.

And then higher by climbing the stairs. We got to go into 4 of the 9 spheres. It was very interesting. They have artwork in some of the spheres. In one, they had a little cafe where you could have a beer or ice cream. (This is Belgium, of course you can get a beer here.) See, if someone tells you that you can't see all of Europe in one day, tell them that it is possible. We did today. (And we even made it back home in time for dinner.) I would call that a success!