Spring in the Hood

Well it is April here in Brussels and several people have asked how the weather is over here. It has been very mild ever since we got here in January. While it did get a bit cold during January and February, it was never really too cold. It would hit the low 30's over night but would generally warm to 40 during the day. It did rain a lot.

As February rolled along and definitely as we got into March, the temperatures climbed. In mid March we were routinely into the 60's and touched 70 once in a while. We saw the crocus' in February and the daffodils came and went in March. Spring has arrived a bit earlier than we were used to from Boston. It still rained a lot.

Now that we're midway through April, I thought I would take a few photos from right around our house. Much is in bloom including several hundred cherry trees that are planted up and down the streets of the neighborhood. I counted 25 trees down the median strip on our block and the immediate blocks in each direction. There is a circle just outside our house that has another 25-30 trees on it. They are all in bloom right now. They also planted loads of flowers all over the place right around Easter. Some of the circles really look nice. It still rains a lot.

We live on Avenue de Mai or May Ave. (There is a street for every month right around us.) Right outside our door is one of the larger traffic circles or rotaries around. This is called Place de Mai and is dedicated to the victory at the end of WW2 - which was on May 8th, 1945. It is a significant holiday here in Belgium, but I will not have the day off from working at NATO. NATO, of course, has representatives from both the winning and losing side, and it's poor form to celebrate the holiday in front of the Germans and Italians.

So, the photo up top is linked to a few shots of Spring in Brussels.