Monday, August 3, 2009

Triathlon in Antwerp


Of course, I didn't complete the triathlon, but my friend Andrew (running above) did and I went along for the ride with a big group of friends. Andrew completed the Antwerp half-Ironman on Sunday, we watched the race and cheered, then spent Monday exploring Brussels. It was a very easy trip on the Eurostar and it was surprisingly fun to watch the triathlon. We spent some time at each of the "transition points" where the racers switch from swimming to biking, then biking to running, and were able to follow Andrew quite a bit.

The biggest challenge was probably getting Andrew's bike to Belgium and into the hostel we stayed at (here we are lugging it up the stairs). Towing the case around the cobbled streets of Antwerp was probably as tiring for me as the actual race was for Andrew.

Here Matt and Talia are eating a Belgian waffle in Brussels with a whole pile of toppings. When in Rome, I guess. Although these types of waffles with toppings on them seem to be set up for tourists.

Jess and I, being sophisticated world travelers, paid a visit to the European Parliament which is hosted in Brussels along with many other EU buildings. The building itself isn't too surprising but they gave a nice tour and I learned much more about how the EU functions. Plus, they had a ton of free EU promotional material, like posters and postcards, which we cleaned them out on.

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