After leaving Heidelberg, we hopped on a train to Brussels, Belgium where we would spend three days. Most of our time was spent at the INSINUME Conference. The conference was a really cool experience. There were engineers and scientist from all over the world there to discuss their research and experiments on different effects radiation has on the natural environment. While a lot of the talks were quite complex and difficult to follow, we had the opportunity to speak with some of the presenters during a poster session where they more thoroughly explained there work its relevance. The conference was very well organized and everyone from insinume was very good to us. While the conference took up a lot of our time, we still made plenty of time for some fun. After one session of the conference, they took us out for a city tour and beer tasting of the delicious Belgian brews. We also frequented Delirium Cafe; a huge bar close to the city center that boast over 2,000 different kind of beers. We of course had to go see Mannken Pis, Brussels most famous landmark which is a disappointingly small statue of a little boy peeing. While Belgium was beautiful, it seems most of the culture revolves around beer, waffles, and chocolate….all of which we were happy to indulge in!
Kings of the castle. What better place for a bottle of German Wine than in the cellar of Heidelberg Castle?
So it’s not a great picture but it’s the only one that shows how huge this wine cask was! Note the people standing in front of it.
This weekend Ben, Nathan, and I traveled to Heidelberg, Germany. It is a beautiful town situated on the Neckar River. The surrounding area is very hilly and lush. Saturday morning we visited Heidelberg Castle, then had some great German food. In the afternoon we rented a little boat and drove up and down the river. Saturday night we met some friends and went and watched the Germany soccer match (along with the whole town). This morning we woke up and went to “The Philosopher’s Way” which is a path high up in the hills where the poets and philosophers who taught at the University here would go ponder during the 18th century. Heidelberg is beautiful and has decent night life…one of my favorite places I’ve been to yet!
The front of Cologne Cathedral. Absolutely massive. Couldn’t even capture the front of the church in one picture.
