After a whopping 9.5hr sleep for me it was time to get ready for beach day or it would have been had we not been in the middle of an epic thunderstorm. But I've said it before and I'll say it again Team SM won't go down without a fight. So a lazy morning it is, the kids do some reading in the hope it will only last an hour however by 11am it's showing no signs of stopping and I remember the games cupboard so the kids start on a game of connect 4.

It's now looking like 2pm until the forecast suggests that sun is returning so we may need a plan c! I have seen that we can get to Bruges on a train in only 15 mins so that might be our plan for tomorrow. As for things to do in Oostende there is an art gallery and some museum on an old looking pirate ship. We decide to have some lunch here first then make a decision. After lunch we're still out of luck with the rain spells continuing to shift throughout the day so executive decision made we're heading to Bruges today. At least there we can find a museum or two, enjoy a walk around the canals and finally have Al's fancy birthday meal. We order an Uber which turns out to be a pointless decision as by the time it finally arrives I think we could have walked to the station but never mind at least we've got cheap, fast and efficient public transport and within no time we're in Bruges.

It's a little trek over to the centre but soon we're on the lookout for something different to entertain us.

Having only been here a few years ago the chocolate and fries museums are out but in the main square we see a Salvador Dali exhibition and decide to give that a go. Always trying to get a deal of some sort Robert pretends he's 9 to get in free. Everything in the exhibit is an original so it's not his most famous work but it's really interesting non the less. We may have scarred Robert, who turns his head if there's a kissing scene in a movie however, as it turns out some of his work is extremely obscene. Our little honey badger of course isn't bothered in the slightest.

Turns out he's illustrated several books and there were some eccentric drawings made for a version of Alice in Wonderland.

Robert picked out his favourite piece which was a statue of a unicorn (didn't even need to be asked the question).

We did also watch a short film he'd made which left us with more questions than answers and ended up explaining to the kids that this was 'art' rather than having a sensible story line. The opening scene was of a man sharpening a razor on a cloud then cutting through a woman's eyelid 🤢. Several of the original pieces were available for sale but I figured €3500 for a page from the Alice in Wonderland book was a little excessive given we've still no idea how much the repair to the van is going to cost us. We did a bit more mooching about before finding ourselves back in some familiar streets and it's time for waffles and ice cream. Robert is over the moon as they have his favourite flavour which he's only ever had once before, cantaloupe melon and Liliya choose a waffle covered in white chocolate.

The weather is a mixed bag and no sooner have we finished eating whilst being entertained by some local musicians then we run for cover from a quick downpour.

We've got time for one last activity and randomly end up walking past a VR experience. It lasts 20 mins and you get to fly over Bruges seeing all the sights, my foot is hurting quite a bit so no walking for a bit is appealing to me.

Everyone enjoyed it although afterwards I did feel a bit motion sick and there wasn't any air con so needed to sit down for a bit afterwards whilst we looked for somewhere to eat. I'm sure it's no surprise that we found a lovely sushi restaurant just 1 min walk away so headed there and ordered the 3-4 person platter. The kids eyes once it arrived was quite hilarious.

Afterwards I decided we still needed to see the canals and we have to buy some beer and chocolates of course so we plotted a route back to the station via the water.

As we're walking back Robert actually spotted the columns mentioned in the VR flight so we change our route back which turns out to be lovely and scenic.

Once we're back realising how close the station actually was to our apartment we walked back which was less than 12 mins then promised the kids if there was no messing around tomorrow we'll eventually get that beach day!