In the spirit of a midweek day off and subsequent closing of all the stores we felt ourselves at loose ends. This is a common condition in our house. Boredom happens when everything in the country is closed on a Thursday. Being that is was a Thursday and unless you were taking Friday as a bridge day going away for an extended weekend was out. Work and school was still in session on Friday making good use of a Thursday holiday even harder.
But don’t worry, we are good at challenges. Since it was Us and we are unpredictable when given vast amounts of time with nothing to do we decided a little road trip was in order. Eupen, Belgium is a mere one hour and twenty minutes from our home. And Belgium was open.
We packed up the kids, plugged in the navi, popped on some tunes and we were off. Our destination?
Carrefour. That most wondrous combination of French grocery store and Walmart wannabe.
Seeing as I had neglected to recognize Thursday as a holiday, I hadn’t gone to the store Wednesday as Boo was home sick. Hence, we didn’t have anything for dinner for Thursday. Carrefour seemed a logical destination in our minds to pick up some extra provisions.
Upon arrival we grabbed a trolley and walked the aisles. I hadn’t seen so much selection in a long time. The mere variety of the items in the pasta aisle for example was almost like being back home at Safeway. We managed to find some wonderful American items we hadn’t seen in a long time. The fun part was all the labels were in French and Dutch. We found:
Lays potato chips
Cheetos Cheese puffs
Minute Made apple juice
We could have gone nuts with the selection. None of these items are found at the local German grocery store. It might have seemed an odd way to spend a holiday, driving to Eupen to go to the grocery store. But we discovered a quaint little town with bricked streets, little cafes and restaurants and cute little shops. There was a lot of character packed into this little town. With the ever present rain we didn’t explore on foot and I didn’t get many good pictures but if your ever looking for something to do on a German holiday remember Eupen, Belgium. A cute place with a Carrefour.
*On a side note please visit The Crazy Coxes on Monday for a new feature PaReNTiNG PaRTY! where she will be asking for your participation on a parenting topic to be handed out every Friday to think on and be discussed on Mondays{this Monday the topic is Rowdy vs Reverent} It’s sure to be a great discussion so please join in!
That's great that you guys found some good food items that you were longing for. I wonder if there's a link between the majority of Americans being so overweight and those items not being available elsewhere. Like somehow our fatty foods are banished from other countries. Ok, it's early and I'm sleep deprived, sorry.
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Yay! I'm glad that y'all figured out a way to have fun even thought Germany was closed.And It strikes me as a little ironic that you found some American foodstuffs just weeks before you come back to America…
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what a wonderful trip!! Glad you found a fun way to spend your 'holi-day'.
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What a cute little town! I love how charming and quaint Europe can be, One of my fave places EVER is in Belgium…. Brugges. It's like a storybook fairy tale town. Don't know how far away it is… but I suppose that's like a European saying, “oh, you live in Boston? LA is one of my favorite places in the world!” ;)Great new header, BTW.
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that was one of the things I liked finding in the US, stuff from Canada. I had connections and postage wasn't as steep but finding it within my state or city, was like a gold find. Glad you found a few things you really enjoy.
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Now that is a very cute city and I'd love to do the same thing if I was there… By the way, love the comment about the Cows… How I miss Europe so much!
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Those pictures make me yearn for a rainy beautiful day
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I long for Cheetos (the classic form)– do you think they have them at Carrefour?
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Hope Boo is feeling better. It must be nice to find products like Lays and Cheetos overseas. Makes you feel closer to home. Thanks for sharing your day.
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HA HA – I haven't been to a Carrefour since I lived in Beijing! Loved to see that sign! And I know all about driving way too far to just go to a grocery store! hee hee
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I LOVE Carrefour. I love all foreign grocery stores. I just love looking at everything. For get the museums, I could spend hours roaming the aisles.Thanks for the shout out. We'll see if anyone joins in!
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I like the new look.I'm horrible for sticking to the familiar when out of the country. I would probably ONLY shop at that place.
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Something about Cheetos always turns a rainy day into fun. 🙂
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I know the weather was lousy when you took the pictures but I have always completely enjoyed them and I feel like I'm really visiting as I travel vicariously through your blog. I love it!
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Yay! I'm glad that y'all figured out a way to have fun even thought Germany was closed.And It strikes me as a little ironic that you found some American foodstuffs just weeks before you come back to America…
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