Interesting places in Brussels:

Brussels City Center		Schaarbeek
Sint-Joost-ten-Node / Saint-Josse-ten-Noode		European Quarter of Brussels
Grand Place - Grote Markt		Atomium
Cinquantenaire Park		Espace Léopold, European Parliament
Cinquantenaire		The Mall
AUDI Brussels production plant		McDonald s Bourse
Brussels City Hall		Berlaymont building
cirque		King Baudouin Stadium ( Heysel )
Brussels Luxembourg Station		Beursschouwburg
Basilica of the Sacred Heart		Palace for Fine Arts - Bozar
Place des Martyrs		Forest National
Paul-Henri Spaak Building (European Parliament)		Ancient Belgique
Vlaamse Media Maatschappij

Brussels (French: Bruxelles, pronounced , and sometimes bg"yksEl by non-Belgian speakers of French; Dutch: Brussel, pronounced ; German: Br�ssel, pronounced ) is the capital of Belgium, of the French Community of Belgium, of the Flemish Community, and is the headquarters of the European Union's institutions (and thus often considered 'The Capital of Europe').

Landmarks

• the Grand Place-Grote Markt . Surrounded by the city tower and a range of beautiful 300 year old buildings. At night, awesome. Some evenings a music and light show is provided with the buildings serving as a canvas. Have a "Gauffre Liègoise-Luikse wafel" here (Belgian waffle with caramelized sugar)—the best ones are available from the little shops off the northeast corner of the Grand Place-Grote Markt.
• Manneken Pis, - just a short walk from the Grand Place-Grote Markt is the Manneken Pis, a small bronze statue thought to represent the "irreverent spirit" of Brussels. This statue of a child performing one of Nature's most basic functions is believed to have been inspired either by a child who, while in a tree, found a special way to drive away invading troops, OR to commemorate a child who found a unique method putting out a fire, that threathened the city. Belgians have created hundred of outfits for this statue , each with a hole strategically placed to allow the water flow to continue.
• Parc du Cinquantenaire-Jubelpark Definitely check out the Arc de Triomphe-Triomfboog on the east side of town. It's in the Parc du Cinquantenaire-Jubelpark. It is possible to go up to the terrasse above the arch, from where you'll have a good view of the city. Take Metro line 1 east, exit Schumann and walk east or exit Mérode and walk west.
• Brave the tourist-trap restaurant gauntlet of the Rue des Bouchers-Beenhouwersstraat

• The Bourse - stock market building

Museums and Galleries

• Les Musées royaux d'Art et d'Histoire (MRAH) - De Koninklijke Musea voor Kunst en Geschiedenis (KMKG) , -

• The Musées Royaux des Beaux Arts-Koninklijke Musea voor Schone Kunsten feature both historical art and modern art in the one building. Opening hours: Museum of Historical Art Tues-Sun 10am-noon and 1-5pm; Museum of Modern Art Tue-Sun 10am-1pm and 2-5pm. Address: Rue de la Régence-Regentschapstraat 3, at Place Royale-Koningsplein, Phone: 02/508-32-11, Prices: € 5.00 adults, € 2.50 students/seniors/disabled visitors, € 1.25 children 12-18, under 12 free. Description: In a vast museum of several buildings, this complex combines the Musée d'Art Ancien-Museum voor Oude Kunst and the Musée d'Art Moderne-Museum voor Moderne Kunst under one roof (connected by a passage). The collection shows off works, most of them Belgian, from the 14th to the 20th century, starting in the historical section, with Hans Memling's portraits from the late 15th century, which are marked by sharp lifelike details, works by Hiëronymus Bosch, and Lucas Cranach's Adam and Eve. You should particularly seek out the subsequent rooms featuring Pieter Brueghel, including his Adoration of the Magi. Don't miss his unusual Fall of the Rebel Angels, with grotesque faces and beasts. But don't fear -- many of Brueghel's paintings, like those depicting Flemish village life, are of a less fiery nature. Later artists represented include Rubens, Van Dyck, Frans Hals, and Rembrandt. Next door, in a circular building connected to the main entrance, the modern art section has an emphasis on underground works - if only because the museum's eight floors are all below ground level. The collection includes works by van Gogh, Matisse, Dalí, Tanguy, Ernst, Chagall, Miró, and local boys Magritte, Delvaux, De Braekeleer and Permeke. Don't miss David's famous "Death of Marat."

• the Horta Museum , - the home of noted Belgian architect and designer Victor Horta. Seeing where he lived and worked is a great way to get an introduction to the art nouveau style in Brussels. It is one of four Horta works to be inscribed on the

• the Centre Belge de la Bande Dessinée - Belgisch Centrum voor het Beeldverhaal , - popularly known as the CéBeBeDé

• Royal Museum for Central Africa (RMCA), Leuvensesteenweg 13, 3080 Tervuren - tram 44, The Museum is home to some truly remarkable collections. Its collection of ethnographic objects from Central Africa is in fact the only one of its kind in the world. It also has in its keeping the entire archives of Henry Morton Stanley which are of great historical value.

• is located in Europe's earliest Shopping-Mall (a shine Jugendstil palais). There is a permanent exposition featuring the early beginning of comics as well as it's development. There is enough room for other varying expositions. Tue-Sun 10am-6pm. Prices: € 7.50 adults, € 6.00 students/seniors. The bookshop Bd at the ground floor sells many different comics. A readers' library operates on the ground floor, where, for a low entrance fee, you can read many different comic books.
• Snapping up a Bargain at the Flea Market. Each day, from 7am to 2pm, the Marché aux Puces-Vlooienmarkt in Place du Jeu de Balle-Vossenplein offers everything from the weird to the wonderful at rock-bottom prices.
• Taking a Ferry Trip. The ferry in question is a tiny, electrically operated pontoon that makes a 1-minute crossing to Robinson's Island in the lake at the heart of Bois de la Cambre.
• The is Brussels' international fantasy film festival ( in french)
• See the history of film-making at Musée du Cinéma-Filmmuseum, it's free to look around, and classic and cult films are shown at low prices. Rue Baron Hortastraat, walk from Gare Centrale-Centraalstation.

Further Afield

Take Metro line 1A direction Roi Baudouin-Koning Boudewijn and alight at Heysel-Heizel.

• the Atomium , - re-opened on February 18 2006 after renovation work was completed. The Atomium was built for the 1958 Brussels World Fair (Expo ’58), it is a 335 foot tall representation of an atom. More precisely, it is symbolic of a unit cell of an iron crystal magnified 165 billion times. Nine steel spheres 54 feet in diameter connect via tubes with elevators 105 feet long. Windows in the top sphere provide an awesome panoramic view of Brussels. Originally planned to last only six months, the Atomium is still today the most popular attraction in Brussels.

• Europe in miniature

About 12 km from Brussels:

• Waterloo Battlefield, Lion Mound - Discover Waterloo Battlefied. See the battlefield exactly like it was June the 18th of 1815 when Wellington faced Napoleon for an ultimate battle that changed Europe's face forever. Visit the Lion Hamlet and experience the new animation: Battlefield Tour.

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Top photos chosen by u all:

Sunrise above the inner circular runway of Brussels
Made by Erroba (slowly recovering from illness)
. About View on the rushing traffic early in the morning on the inner ring of Brussels. The Shot I pass this point every day when I'm walking to work, the morning before I noticed that the sunrise was throwing beautiful orange light on the buildings so I decided to bring my camera and tripod the next day. The traffic is rushing in and out a tunnel and I'm standing above it, I wanted to show how busy the traffic is here. There was already plenty of light and even with the diaphragm set to f32, the exposure time was too short to be able to catch those light stripes, so I screwed on the polarizer to block some more light, this made the longest of the 3 exposures to go up to 5 seconds, so that was ok. Photoshop I did a lot of touching up on this shot, there were artifacts due to the 3 different exposures and the moving traffic, especially in the white stripes on the left, so I manually painted some extra white in, using my Wacom tablet, which is an unmissable tool for such things. The trees were too dark in comparison to the rest so I used Brightness/Contrast and masked everything but the trees out. I also changed the saturation in 3 different steps, using a mask to only apply the saturation on certain areas. You All comments, criticism and tips for improvements are ( as always ) welcome.


Interior of the 'Kappellekerk', Brussels - Belgium
Made by Erroba (slowly recovering from illness)
Best viewed in LARGE. . About This is the interior of the church known as Kapellekerk. The shot Standard 3 exposures HDR [-2..0..+2EV] in RAW at AV f/11 on a tripod using the Sigma 10mm fisheye lens and a remote. I'm actually betting on it that the fisheye is much better for certain interior shots such as this than a normal wide angle lens which gives a strong perspective distortion, where here the slightly bended walls actually add a sense of space to the place. I've shot this on a sunny day at around 12 o'clock during my lunch break, so I was sure to have lovely light coming through the windows. Photoshop Curves and a bit saturation. Some extra dodging of the ribs and the light on the floor. Remove a distracting spot of blue on the floor. Added some extra light on the windows by copying the most contrasting channel into a layer, boosting the contrast of it using levels ( ctrl-L ), removing any unwanted parts from that and finally performing a radial blur with the source set to the position where the light is supposed to come from. You All comments, criticism and tips for improvements are ( as always ) welcome. Music Lifeforms part 1 - Future sound of London[CD:Lifeforms]


Foxbase Alpha
Made by -RobW-
As a kid, and in fact still, I was fascinated by futurology images. My bedroom was wallpapered with posters of how we'd live in the year 2000 - giant orbital habitats, 3km tall skyscraper cities with parks in between - you know the sort of thing. Futurama, basically. The trouble with that is that 2000 has been and gone, and I'm not living in an orbital habitat, damn it. I can't holiday on the Moon. I'm severely disappointed. This picture is an attempt to recreate that look. It is supposed to imply either an orbital or otherworld habitat. I haven't decided quite which. It helps that the Atomium was built in the 50s, the golden era of futurology. It's the best example of the sort of place I was sure I'd be living in by now I can think of. ENGAGE THE ENLARGE-O-MAT


Graffiti at train station KapelleKerk
Made by Erroba (slowly recovering from illness)
Best viewed in LARGE. . About The abundant graffiti at train station Kappelekerk, Brussels - Belgium The shot My first 6 exposures HDR [-2,-1,0,1,2,3EV] in RAW/ISO100 at AV f/13 on a tripod using the Sigma 10mm fisheye lens and a remote. Photoshop Curves for extra contrast. Tuned down the saturation. A bit of dodging. A small unsharp mask. You All comments, criticism and tips for improvements are ( as always ) welcome. Music Especially watch the drummer, which always reminds me of Animal, the drummer from The Muppet Show. I am the sun - Dark Star (Live at Jools Holland) [CD:twenty twenty sound] .


Portrait Of The Unknown Saxophonist
Made by an untrained eye
September 12th, 2008 - Brussels, Belgium This man was playing near the royal park in the centre of Brussels on a Friday afternoon as commuters made their way home. To be honest his look was better than his sound, though I always find something admirable in those artists, particularly musicians, who force themselves to go out and perform in public when they know they're not really up to it. This photograph was used on July 27th, 2009 to illustrate an article entitled Who's your favourite undiscovered photographer ? on the photography blog Epic Edits. There are some great links suggested by commenters, well worth checking out. Please click here to view on black.


Orange
Made by sigfus.sigmundsson
One of the great things about Brussels is the culture and art which I find thriwing in the city. You walk a certain street and suddenly there is a new artwork there that wasn´t there last time you were there. I was walking towards downtown the other day when I saw this new artwork. What an original idea (or should I say orange idea;)).... For those who don´t know, this is an artwork of Arne Quinze, called The Sequence, you can read all about it here: www.thesequence.be/SEQUENCE_BLOG/index.html And you can read all about the artist here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arne_Quinze


Brussels airport - Zaventem
Made by jackfre2
The airport is home to around 260 companies, together directly employing 6,000 people. In 2005, the airport was awarded Best Airport in Europe by Airports Council International/International Air Transport Association (ACI/IATA), based on a survey conducted with over 100,000 passengers worldwide. The construction of a new low-cost airlines pier is currently on hold. It will be built roughly where the old south pier used to be. At present, several low-cost airlines including Ryanair and Wizz Air fly to Brussels South Airport, actually located in Charleroi, 40 km (25 mi) away from Brussels. In March 2009, the old mechanical Flight information display system were replaced by electronic ones.


Brussels North train station sunset
Made by Erroba (slowly recovering from illness)
. About The early sunset throws its reflection of the train station Brussels North. The shot I was on my way down the platform to take my other two shots of the building that I had noticed before, Building in sunset and Building in sunset (2nd shot), when I noticed the great view of North Station with the sun bouncing of. Normal 3 exposure Hdr. Photoshop Just a tiny 'Curves' and a bit of extra saturation (+8), a little unsharp mask, no cropping or anything else. You All comments, criticism and tips for improvements are ( as always ) welcome.


Marbles
Made by just.Luc
GAME AT MARBLES (Author unknown, from an antique children's book) Just have a game of marbles, there's plenty of time to spare; Here's a capital bit of ground, by the railings of the square. There's no policeman near, and very few people about, And no one will interfere, and Bob turned his marbles out. Then the idle school-boys began to play, and all about school forgot; And the butcher's boy forgot his meat, and the baker's boy his bread; And there they stayed to watch the game: There's plenty of time, they said. But time fled fast, although they took of it no heed; And when they heard eleven strike, they were surprised indeed.


Quotes - 06/60
Made by B.Romain
Do you mind if i don't smoke ? ~ Groucho Marx. I'm finaly back from Brussels with a thousand shots to post. I've found some great bokeh-spots in this city. I'll try to upload them within the next few days. I'm happy with the ST-e2. He works fine outside. The only problem is autofocus : There's no way to use it on my 70-200, i need an external light to assist. The infrared-focus works sometimes on the 50mm, but remain quite painful. Setup : 580ex II @ 50mm - 1/32 in front of her, triggered by ST-e2. . Follow me on Twitter.


Galleries St-Hubert, Brussels - Belgium
Made by Erroba (slowly recovering from illness)
Best viewed in LARGE. . . About These are the galleries St-Hubert in Brussels. For more info see this shot : The shot Single freehand shot using the Sigma 10mm fisheye lens. Photomatix Tonemapped. Photoshop A little curves. Some dodging. You All comments, criticism and tips for improvements are ( as always ) welcome. Music boards of canada - alpha and omega [CD:Geogaddi]


Graffiti wall - Kapellekerk, Brussels - Belgium
Made by Erroba (slowly recovering from illness)
Best viewed in LARGE. . . About Some more graffiti near Kapellekerk station, Brussels - Belgium. The shot Standard 3 exposures HDR on a tripod using the Sigma 10mm fisheye lens and a remote control. Photoshop Curves for extra contrast. Some dodging to emphasize the graffiti. You All comments, criticism and tips for improvements are ( as always ) welcome. Music State of the nation - Fad Gadget


Quotes - 14 / 60
Made by B.Romain
The monument sticks like a fishbone in the city's throat ~ Robert Lowell. Next quote ! There's a timelapse of this scene downside, within comments. It was a so cold night. The ground was icy. The feets of my girlfriend and me were frozen. I'm still on the road most of the time, but I carry my gear with me as often as I can. Vertex 300 is just the most perfect bag ever. I'm having so much fun with my tripod and my remote. There will soon be more shots of that kind on this stream. . Follow me on Twitter.


The Delectable Delights of Selecta
Made by Gilderic (Very very slow internet connection)
In its treasure chest, Selecta the robot has everything you need to bear the urban life. Bars of love. Bottles of happiness. Bags of hope. All delights to transform in red during a brief moment your blue llfe in red. Selecta le robot a tout ce qu'il faut pour vous aider à supporter cette existence urbaine. Des barres d'amour. Des bouteilles de bonheur. Des sachets d'espoir. De quoi, l'espace d'un instant, transformer en rouge votre vie si bleue. Saint Guido Metro Station, Brussels Station de Metro Saint Guidon, Bruxelles.


It's Not Only Rock 'n' Roll, Baby !
Made by an untrained eye
September 12th, 2008 - Brussels, Belgium Not that I needed reminding of the fact. I thought about cropping this to include just the books and the pinstriped gentleman's head (see the note above). Of course, if this had been taken in the City of London and not outside the Bo Zar museum in Brussels, he might have been wearing a bowler hat (chapeau melon), and the juxtaposition would have been that much more comical... Please click to view large on black.


Imagination in the city
Made by wimpers
I always loved this house/building, at a street corner. Although I don't know him/her, I like the person who came up with the idea to do it this way, and the ones who paid for it, and the actual realisators. Great experience to discover a house like this suddenly in the city! Like an unexpected gift! :-D Imagination spices up our daily lives! --- Brussels, along the Canal, near VlaamsePoort/Porte de Flandre. --- U can check here for other of my pictures.


Winter at the Orchard - Tournay Solvay Park
Made by Vainsang
The orchard located on the hill side of the Tournay Solvay Park in Brussels, Boitsfort. To learn more about this beautiful plase, visit bbs.keyhole.com/ubb/ubbthreads.php?ubb=showflat&Numbe... See my most interesting pics at: www.fluidr.com/photos/vainsang/interesting


Is photography a crime?
Made by Mike G. K.
Brussels Subway/Metro best seen :) While I was taking this photo, a security guard asked me to leave. Maybe he thought that I am a spy or a terrorist. This was our conversation: Security: Why are you taking photos? Me: Because I like taking photos Security: Just that? Me: Yes, just that. Security: It is not allowed to take photos. Me: But there are no No Photography signs. Security: You have to leave.


BRUSELAS: GALERIAS SAINT-HUBERT
Made by Miguel_CD
Son unas elegantes galerías comerciales situadas en el centro de Bruselas. Fueron proyectadas por el arquitecto Jean-Pierre Cluysenaar e inauguradas en 1847. Se dividen en tres zonas (las Galerías del Rey, las de la Reina y las de los Príncipes). Para saber más: www.ilotsacre.be/site/fr/curiosites/galerie_st_hubert.htm


Quotes - 15/60
Made by B.Romain
Once you're on the wheel, you don't come off ~ Ian St. John. Shot at the christmas market from the place Sainte Catherine. This is the last upload of 2009. I hope you all enjoyed this year as I did. I wish you a happy, wonderful and photographyful, even if this word doesn't even exist, new year ! . Follow me on Twitter.