On our second day of the tour with Roskilde flying club (RFK) we were going to explore the city of Ostend. Ostend has been known as a town since 1265 when the inhabitants were allowed to hold a market and to build a market hall. The major source of income was fishing. Today, Ostend is one of the two largest fishing ports in Belgium. There is an open-air fish market daily, except for some major holidays and the days when there is a storm at sea. The sea not only brought food and prosperity, but also trouble. Ostend was frequently taken and destroyed by conquering armies.
The barquentine Mercator (photo above) was built as a training ship for the Belgian merchant fleet in Scotland in 1932. The vessel was named after Gerardus Mercator, Flemish cartographer. On one of the expeditions that started in 1934, Mercator visited Easter island, and brought back to Europe two of the famous moai statues from the island that were donated by the Chilean government, one to France and one to Belgium. What a gift! [Today, everything on Easter Island is protected by law, and one is not allowed to take a small stone from this beautiful island which is very good. But, when I was there for some years ago, all passengers in the airport leaving the island were taken through a strict baggage control. However, after that you could take anything you wanted on board of the plane!]
St. Peter and St. Paul church in the heart of Ostende:
The church is from 1907, and has a tomb of of Louise-Marie, the queen of Belgium who deceased in Ostend. Its stained glass windows were destroyed during the two World Wars and were later replaced. The church is 70 meters long and 30 meters wide. Its spires are 72 meters high.
I was very tired – all that work, you know – so I did this tour of the city on my own. I combined shopping with coffee breaks, and with sightseeing. The port of Ostend that was founded in 1584 (it was redeveloped several times during its history):
I loved the “Rock Strangers” – an installation of metal on the Heroes of the Sea square. This artwork was created by Arne Quinze, a Belgian conceptual artist:
This installation which is 100 metres in diameter, comes in a strong contrast with the surroundings of nature and people, and provokes thinking about new and unexpected things in our lives.
Ostend cannot be called a charming place, the beauty of this city is in its shoreline; but sometimes you are lucky to discover one or two of the old houses, squeezed in between some modern buildings:
And what about a corner like the one on the photo below? Yellow arrow points at an old flat that somehow survived all those rebuilds; green arrow – at a super modern penthouse addition to an older house. The rest is just a mix of older and newer…
There was a fruit and veggies market, and I couldn’t get my eyes off those colourful tomatoes. Such a contrast to a grey day, almost the same effect as the Rock Strangers:
I bought some good Belgian chocolate, and went back to the hotel. It was nice to have time to relax with my feet up. Chocolate did the magic (it always does!).
For dinner, we went to l’Apéro Oostende, restaurant with the sea view where we had a table pre-booked.
The food was truly delicious. I had coquilles St. Jacques for a starter, in a white wine sauce, and it was mouth-watering. I love scallops so much that I eat them whenever I can. [The best ones I got so far were on the La Réunion island three years ago – and I still remember it.] With Pernille, having a glass of wine:
My main was gambas, in a house version, and it was also yummy:
Crème brûlée for desert was excellent. I haven’t had it for ages – too much fat, but in a company of friends from the Roskilde flying club I would do an exception! Others also praised the food they ordered – it was simply superb.
But there was one strange thing with this restaurant. It was only 1/3 full, and they asked us to order as many of the same dishes/menues as possible – because it would be very difficult for them to prepare food for 11 persons, if every single dish was different. Quite unprofessional, I would say! Spoiled by tourists?
Anyway, we enjoyed the dinner and our evening together:
The following day we were going to Bruges, the capital of West Flanders about 20-25 km from Ostend.
