The Abbey at Villers-la-Ville

The Villers abbey (Wiki, Pictures) is a short drive from Brussels hardly 20 min from the suburb of Waterloo. Founded in 1146 , it's one of the only complete medieval Abbey ruins left in Europe. The grounds include the Abbot's Palace and garden, kitchens, scriptorium, dormitory, very large church, workshop, hostelry, prison and more. The prison was actually mentioned by Victor Hugo in Les Miserables. In it's height it was the home of a couple dozen monks and over 300 brothers with thousands of peasants and tenant farmers working a large range of land surrounding the abbey. It was a wealthy enterprise for most of the middle ages until it was burned out by French revolutionaries in 1796.

I was rather surprised to see a railway (built in 1855) cut through the grounds of the abbey ruining any good panoramic shots of the site, but they managed to preserve the entire site dispate the unfortunate addition.

It's a great site to visit because you can get very close to very old art and architecture. Much thanks to my friend Madigan for tipping me off on this site. The pictures are not the best I have made, but you can't beat the subject matter for light, color and contrast.

Miscellaneous pics from the last two months

Here are some miscellaneous photos from over past few months. Not much traveling in April. I spent most of it in the US getting my affairs in order for an extended assignment. There are some pics for around Brussels, Waterloo and from the military museum. I revisited the later two to show a few co-workers some sites around Brussels.

At Waterloo I walked by Hougomont (wiki) which looks to be a fully functioning farm still. It's hard to get to, but I think part of the wall remains in in place on opposite end of the farm. Also caught a monument of Victor Hugo and the site of the last stand of the French from the battlefield where several companies refused to surrender though where surrounded. This is today represented by a monument of an Eagle with a Broken wing and defensive claw raised refusing to let go of the French Imperial Banner.

A few other pics show some things I missed in the first run at the Royal Military Museum. I finally got a close look at the 88 they have there.