The view from the top

What more needs to be said? Beautiful. Brussels looks good at any time of day, but is by far at its best during twilight. Here's a view over the town centre from a popular photo-spot - the top of the Mont des Arts, so named for its collection of cultural buildings. If you want to read, see or listen to anything, this is the place to do it. The complex consists of an assortment of handsome sandstone buildings surrounding a pretty little manicured park, which connects the medieval "low town" to the regal boulevards of the "high town."

Contrary to popular perception Belgium does manage a hill or two, and Brussels itself slopes gently downwards from east to west. Further to my previous bike travails, I've taken to using vehicles to reach the higher parts of the city and then gliding back down towards home on a rented cycle. I've now found several scenic routes which are entirely downhill, allowing you to soar down into the centre without your feet having so much as touched a pedal. My kind of exercise!*

Normally I'd leave unsightly cranes out of photos, but if you look closely at this one's load you might just be able to make out what makes it special - this is "Brussels in the Sky," a unique and very exclusive restaurant. Every night throughout June, twenty-two people with more money than sense are strapped into chairs and raised high into the evening air to eat a gourmet meal prepared by a chef who cooks up there with them. Half of me thinks it sounds like a naff money-spinner but the other half is itching to try it. In a city where you can eat anything imaginable, the sky truly is the limit.

*A little word about biking à la belge:
The city's bike rental scheme - which I seem to be mentioning a lot - is called Villo!, which I'm guessing is a play on the words ville and vélo. It costs ?30 for a year's use, which is so cheap that it's essentially free. You get as many free rides of thirty minutes as you can manage, with a (very) small charge if you exceed the half hour, and I can't describe how liberating and exciting it is just to be able to get a bike and nip about town at will. If, unlike me, you do possess the pedal power to reach the "high town" by bike, Villo! will give you ten free bonus minutes each time you dock a bike at a higher station.