Grund By Night

Casemate Bock at Night

It works!  We successfully avoided the ill effects of jet lag by sleeping away the time difference on the train ride from Brussels to Luxembourg City.  The fruits of our experiment have already been incredible.

When we landed in Brussels, the weather was phenomenal.  It was sunny and about 42 degrees.  Yet as we chugged through the countryside, the weather got increasingly worse.  By the time we arrived in Luxembourg City, it was dreary and raining steadily.  It was about a 1 km walk to our hotel.  Even though it was raininig, the walk through the city was really enjoyable.  It was almost like walking back through time as we moved from the train station, in the new part of the city, to the old town.

Our hotel, the Parc Beaux Arts Hotel, is located right in the center of the old town.  It's a beautiful hotel that they created out of several old houses.  The downstairs is also a restaurant and bar that, especially given the selections of soft jazz spilling into the air, makes you feel like you're in the 1920s and hanging out with F. Scott Fitzgerald and Zelda.

We got into the city around 4:00 in the afternoon and quickly confirmed what I already suspected - everything is closed during the holiday season.  Yet neither that nor the weather deterred us from exploring the city.

Kati on the Wenzel Walk

The old town is really divided into two parts by the Alzette river.  The river, has dug out a very large area of the city.  There is the traditional "old town" (which I call the high town) and Grund, which is in the basin of the Alzette river "valley."  Initially, I just wanted to go to Grund to see the Neurumberg Abbey, but I'm so glad that we made the trip.  The Abbey ended up being closed for the holidays, but we walked around exploring nonetheless.  We must have been guided by our good friend St. Wenceslas (the patron saint of beer), because we stumbled onto the Wenzel Walk (his walk), which led us up to some stunning views from the plateau in Grund.  We could see the new city, the old town, the Casemates Bock, and everything in between.  The highlight had to have been walking along old ramparts and up and down stone fortifications and catching some of the most stunning nightscapes the city has to offer.

We wanted to grab dinner at Am Tiirmschen, a well-known local restaurant specializing in Luxembourgish cuisine.  The only problem was that they were booked solid until 9:00.  Our solution was to go back to the Beaux Arts restaurant and bar and waste a little time.  We grabbed a few glasses of wine and a plate of Luxembourgish charcutterie to tide us over until dinner (all of which were excellent).  Finally, it was dinner time and Am Tiirmschen lived up to the hype.  Kati got what I've been told is Luxembourg's unofficial dish, smoked pork in a cream sauce over broad beans.  It was truly some of the most incredible pork either of us has ever had.  I went for a lamb shank with vegetables (which was also very good).

After dinner, we weren't quite ready to call it a night, so we stopped in at Steiler, the oldest pub in Luxembourg.  It opened in 1691!  We had an amazing time amongst the Luxembourg locals, socializing to some interesting electronica remixes of popular songs.  The best part was really good beer was dirt cheap.  I got a Diekirsh amber ale, the darker relative of Luxembourg's most popular beer (named after the town it's brewed in to the north).  It was alright, but it couldn't compare to the beer that Kati got - La Chouffe, an amazing Belgian brew.  After two drinks at Steiler, we decided to call it a night so that we'd be well-rested for our big Sunday.