Last week I went to Antwerp, a.k.a Anvers! It was my first time there and I was really impressed! I went with a good friend of mine by train. I thought maybe it's fun to make a blogpost about the citytrip so here's how it went. Actually I can't call it a citytrip according to a friend of mine who studies tourism because a citytrip must be longer than 24 hours with a night stay.. Oh well.. Wednesday morning, my alarm rang at 05:00 AM so it was time to get out of bed and get dressed. We wanted to get the train of 06:29 AM to Roosendaal. Unfortunately, I was a few minutes too late (It's a tradition, I guess..) so we had to wait for the next train. We were afraid that we would miss the other trains as well, so we had to run at every change of the train. In Roosendaal I had to check out and we only had 4 minutes before the train to Antwerp left, so we had to run down stairs to the other side of the station, check out and then we had to run back and we literally JUMPED into the NS Hispeed train to Antwerp! All in all, we were able to make it on time to every train. After travelling for like three houres, we FINALLY arrived in the lovely and sunny Antwerp.


The station looked incredible already so we couldn't wait to get to know the city. We started the day with some Belgium waffles which was très delicieux. I bought a waffle with yummy warm and melted chocolate on it. We didn't really know where the Meir was so we just followed the crowd haha. The Meir is the well known shopping street of Antwerp. It's just a 10 minute walk from the central station. While walking through the Meir, we held our eyes open for the Forever 21. When we finally found it and stepped into the store, we were like oh-my-god! It was just HEAVEN ON EARTH! It was sooo pretty. All the clothes, the interior, the lights, the colours and even the floor. It was incredible! We didn't know where to begin.. Halfway through the store, I had too many clothes under my arms so I had to grab a bag. When we went up to the first floor, we were even more flabbergasted.. All the jewelry looked like candy. Seriously. It didn't know WHAT to buy or to choose.. Well, two hours later we were finally done shopping in Forever 21.


The Forever 21 is settled halfway through the Meir so we skipped a lot of shops to get there first. After we left F21, we walked back and visit shops like Zara, Bershka, New Look.. It was 13:30 PM by then so we decided to get some lunch at La Place in the Stadsfeestzaal which was a mall which looked so incredibly beautiful from the exterior AND interior! Then we wandered in the side streets, looking for little, unknown shops. Suddenly we were in the Schuttershofstraat which was the P.C. Hooftstraat of Antwerp with shops like Hermès, Chanel, Louis Vuitton.. I realized that there was a freshly opened Ladurée in the same street. I held my French presentation about Ladurée so I know a lot about it now. At first we were a bit lost but THANK GOD for Google Maps. Suddenly I saw something green and I thought that MUST be Ladurée! My instinct was right! It was a little, cute and beautiful shop. The doorway was a little small, I think Antwerp isn't made for fat people because the escalator in F21 was small as well! I decided to go for the 'reglette napoleon verte' with 6 macarons which was 14,90 euros. I didn't know which flavours I had to choose so I went save. J'ai choisi pour le macaron caramel à la fleur de sel, pistache, café, vanille, incroyable fraise bonbon et noix de coco. I think this was my best buy during the whole trip haha! I was so happy because when I was in Paris in May 2011 with school, we didn't got time to visit Ladurée.. The macarons were delicious by the way. Next time I'll buy a 'boîte Arabesque' with 8 macarons in it.


We bumped into the Brandy Melville on our way back to the main street. During the whole shopping spree I was looking for a cool shirt with a tiger on it and there it was.. I saw the perfect 'Richard Parker' shirt with dropped armholes. That's how my friend called it when I sent her a picture of it haha! Oh and you will only get it when you have watched Life of Pi which is an amazing movie by the way! Seriously, the Brandy Melville is such an awesome store with amazing clothes.. WHY HAVEN'T I VISITED IT BEFORE? There is namely a Brandy Melville store in Amsterdam. Certainly a shop I will pay a visit to the next time when I'm in Amsterdam!

Meanwhile it was 15:00 PM, the sun was gone and it was so cold and windy! We walked back and suddenly my partner in crime tells me that her sister was on her way to Antwerp! She studies in Gent now which is also in Belgium. We met up at Starbucks but we drank some tea at a biologic café. It was really amusing to see her again and hear all her stories. I'm so jealous! I can't wait untill I can go to school in a foreign country. Three years to go.. Well, after her sister has done a super speed shopping spree, we grabbed some dinner at the big M, how romantic! My friend and I had to get the train from 19:50 PM and we were there on time but conductor wasn't. We had a delay from 15 minutes so we missed every train but we decided to take another train to the North. Finally, we arrived at our destination at 23:45 PM.


To conclude all, IT WAS AN AMAZING DAY! I loooove Antwerp so much. It's the perfect city for a shopping spree! I will definetly visit this city again in summer. I recommend it to you all because it will definetly be worth it! It's not so hard to get there. The day before I bought a ticket on www.nshispeed.nl for the train from Roosendaal to Antwerp (and back, of course) which is a 55 minute ride. The only thing you have arrange is to get to Roosendaal! We come from the North so we had to travel for more than two hours to get in Roosendaal. And like we thought at first, the Meir wasn't difficult to find. When you exit the central station you walk straight into the biggest street. After a 10 minute walk you see a lot of shops and then you realize you are walking into the right street! Stay tuned for a shoplog ;-)