'It's a shit hole' pronounced Colin Farrell's Irish gangster character in the black comedy 'In Bruges'. And of course everybody who saw the film wanted to head there straight away - it must have done wonders for the Belgian tourist trade.
Is Bruges one of the most romantic towns on earth? Quite possibly. That's how it feels to me anyway. We are half way through our seven week overseas trip and this is the first place we have been on our own. We have had an absolute ball staying with friends and family, but now it is lovely to just be us.
The sun has shone every day we have been here, and it feels like being in a picture postcard. I've never been in such an apparently unspoiled and benign place. Where are the police, the groups of surly young guys lounging threateningly on street corners, the beggars, the graffiti, the road rage, the pushy shop owners? There's got to be a dark underbelly to Belgian society, but it's not obvious in central Bruges. I've spent time in many places, including touristy ones, and never have I felt safer and less pressured. There may be dark things going on somewhere, but I have been happy to ignore my consciousness of this and simply revel quietly in a calm and charming visitors' paradise.
I have a series of photos in my camera: bed in Bruges - our king size bed piled with gleaming white linen and multiple pillows with me sitting there in a robe (they have robes in this guest house!); beer in Bruges - me grinning over a brimming goblet of Belgian beer (we are told there are 1130 varieties); bubbly in Bruges - me looking pensively out of the window of our walled garden, holding a glass of champagne that was waiting for us when we arrived. Breakfast in Bruges - every day we have freshly squeezed orange juice, a slim glass of yoghurt with fresh fruit and nuts, bruschetta topped with cheese and herbs freshly picked from the walled garden, omelette garnished with edible nasturtiums, (also freshly picked from walled garden) and tiny, plump, round pancakes soaked in mandarin liqueur. Plus tea and coffee.   Our bed and breakfast in Bruges has its fair share of photos too. We are staying in a fifteenth century home that has been altered remarkably little in the intervening centuries. Boats of tourists pass on the canal that borders the garden and take pictures of the place. Our bedroom windows have leaded panes of glass with intricate medieval glass pictures of scenes from the life of Christ. It is unbelievably beautiful and old and backs onto the Church of our Lady, one of the main land marks in the old city, so that even I can never get lost in the winding cobbled streets for long. Our host is an artist who adores his city and has little trouble infusing us with his passion.
The first afternoon there, after a five a.m. start from Dublin and a ten hour trip involving car, bus, plane, bus, train, long walk, we change out of our jeans and walking shoes into summer gear more appropriate to the thirty degree sunshine, and wander out to buy hot chocolate (with complimentary florentine) which we drink sitting on the canal watching the swans. We wander on and chance upon a street market, where Al buys me a scarf that is midnight blue and purple and silver. I am thrilled about my scarf, I am thrilled to have successfully negotiated Ryan Air and the bewildering train station in Brussels, I am thrilled to be able to unpack our suitcases for a few days, that the accommodation I organized long ago in Melbourne turns out to be even better than I had hoped.
From our room, apart from the occasional tourist boat passing, all we can hear are church bells and the clip clip of hooves on cobble stones as other tourists pass in their horse and cart.
For three days we do little but walk and walk, drinking it in, stopping for hot chocolate and walking some more. There are barely any modern buildings in the central part of Bruges. The medieval bricks they are built of are tiny and all the soft shades of cream and rose that I love in Federation Square back home. 
Bruges is full of wonders, and peace. Colin Farrell's verdict notwithstanding, I'd have to agree with the Brendan Gleeson character in the movie - for this traveller at least, it's like a fairy tale.