The Atomium
Elisabeth, Kate and I drove North of Brussels to Heysel to see The Atomium and Mini-Europe. It was our first big outing of just the Snyder girls. We arrived around 10:30am and found a terrific free parking space on the street. An impressive walk up a green lawn to the Atomium and incredible view of the city of Brussels. The Atomium was built for the World Fair in Brussels (Expo 1958) and is a very unique creation in the history of architecture. It symbolizes an iron crystal, magnified 165 billion times, referring to the power of nuclear energy in full development at that time and which was intended for peaceful use. We ate lunch in the cafe in one of the crystals. It felt like we were in space during lunch and while riding the escalators. Riding the escalator down we noticed a children's exhibit of sleeping "pods" - Elisabeth is anxious to have an overnight!
Mini-Europe
The girls were excited to walk over to Mini-Europe from the Atomium (at the Atomium the girls noticed a carousel out one of the windows - they love carousels). They were real troopers and didn't ask to be carried or shoulder rides. First, we rode the carousel. Second, we entered Mini-Europe. They noticed immediately the cities they had visited: The Grand Plaza in Brussels, the canals in Ghent and Brugges, the Eiffel Tower in Paris, etc.
Mini-Europe allows guests to learn more about the European Union (EU): to find out what these different people and countries have in common and what makes each one special (the models are built down to the finest detail to a scale of 1:25). I think the girls were very intrigued by London. Perhaps our next destination over Thanskgiving weekend. However, I enjoyed the models of the Northern European countries: Norway, Sweden, Finland, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, etc. Not sure how we will fit it all before August - a Baltic cruise next summer looks appealing.
