Brussels, Belgium — My Little Travel Hobby

Brussels with a Baby and a Toddler

Welcome to our Europe vacation with a baby and toddler part 2, where we spent 5 nights in the beautiful city of Brussels, Belgium. We had so much fun in Brussels with our kids. There are plenty of kid friendly activities in Brussels.

If you missed part one where we visited Amsterdam, click here to go read about our Amsterdam with kids adventure. We traveled by NS International train and that trip was roughly 3 hours. Both kids enjoyed the train ride and took much needed naps.

Getting from Amsterdam to Brussels via Train

We chose the NS International for 2 reasons. First, the Eurostar only had an afternoon departure since we waited until a few weeks before our June trip to book. Second, the NS International train took us directly into Brussels Centraal, leaving our walk to the hotel only about 10 minutes. The walk was over mostly over cobblestone so the roller bags were a little bit of a struggle but our Mockingbird stroller handled them like a champ. When walking to the hotel room, you walk through the Grand Place. The architecture in this area is breath taking.

Where to Stay in Brussels with a baby and a toddler

We stayed at Hotel Saint-Gér y in their junior suite which turned out to be a great decision because of the room size and location. We make it a point when we travel to book hotels that have cribs availabl e so bringing Pack N Plays is not necessary. When we got up to the room, the sofa bed was already pulled out and made up for our son, as well as the crib already in the room and waiting for our youngest. The room was nice and spacious equipped with an espresso machine and mini refrigerator. We were traveling over Fathers Day weekend and I surprised my husband with a bottle of sparkling wine in the room when we got there. We had a room on the top floor with sky light windows that opened.

Day 1 in Brussels with a toddler and a baby

We arrived later in the afternoon, so after unpacking and enjoying a couple glasses of bubbles, we ventured out into the city. We had dinner at Cafe Novo, which is known for their Flemish stew. They do not have high chairs but the inside was not busy so we were able to pull our stroller up beside the table. However, they do have a kid’s menu. They also have outdoor seating on a back patio.

Brussels is known for many things, but I would say food wise you can look forward to Mussels, Frites, and chocolate. We enjoyed it all while here. Elisabeth and Leonidas were our favorite chocolate shops to pop into on the way home from dinner for a special treat.

Day 2 Museum of Illusions/ Delirium Village

Our first morning in Belgium, we knew it needed to involve waffles. We went to Maison Dandoy which was only a 5 minute walk from our hotel. This place was perfect, it offered to-go orders on the first floor or sit down service on the 2nd floor. We chose to sit down and enjoy the food. Here, you can order waffles with basically anything you could imagine on them. The service was great the food and coffee were even better.
The Brussels Discovery Tour looks awesome. Waffles, chocolate, beer, and sightseeing all in one tour. We opted not to do this with the kids because we like to go at our own pace with them.
One really nice thing about Brussels is there is a lot of the entertainment within walking distance. We never had to use the public transit while we were in the city.
Next we wanted to figure out something the kids would enjoy doing and we decided on the Museum of Illusions. The museum was extremely kid friendly and our son really enjoyed walking around and seeing all the different displays. It was actually kind of hard to get our son to leave this museum because of so much to see and do.
I finally decided to reward my husband for being a really good sport the whole day, and we headed to the Delirium village. I do not know if there are rules against kids here or not but no one said anything to us. We went twice during our stay and no one ever had a problem with us.
For our first visit to Delirium Village, we got a seat in the Delirium cafe. My husband loves all kinds of beers so the best choice when we got there was a flight. The flight here was great and came with 10 different beers. In the village there was multiple different locations that you can choose from including a Taphouse, Cafe, and Hoppy Loft just to name a few.
Item descriptionThat night we had dinner at Chez Leon. This place was extremely kid friendly including high chairs and servers that knew how to deal with children that have had a long day. Normally our son is a very easy going toddler to take to dinner, but on this night he was having a little bit of a melt down. The servers quickly helped and brought paper and crayons and were completely understanding he was a little over tired and in his feelings. This is the first place we got mussels and fries. There were numerous options for the mussels and they were phenomenal. The food was great and the service was even better, highly recommend. What is really great for families is kids eat free!

As you will see, we do not spend lots of time in the room. We usually try and get our kids to nap in the stroller or at least our 1 year old. When we are trying to get our kids to sleep, is when we usually try and fit in some of our shopping. This worked to perfection this day and I was able to go shopping for a solid uninterrupted hour. There is a ton of shopping around city center in Brussels. You have the big chain stores, the local shops, and kid boutiques.

Day 3

We started our third day with breakfast at restaurant that had a view of the Grand Place. We ate at Le Roy de Espagne, which had outdoor and indoor seating. We sat outside because the weather was really nice with a little cloud cover and cool temperature. The food was really good here and the people watching was even better. A lot of tourists come to look around the Grand Place because of the architecture and perfect places to take vacation photos.
This place was nice because of the views and being able to just pull the stroller right beside the table. Breakfast was a nice time to visit as it was not as busy as later in the day.
From breakfast we headed to one of my highlights of the trip in Brussels, the chocolate museum. I really enjoy all kinds of chocolate and this museum gives you the history of where it came from to where it is now. When entering you receive a headset that can be tuned to numerous different languages allowing you to hear really interesting facts about the history of chocolate. Towards the end of walking through museum, there is a room that had chocolate samples, that I took advantage of. And the final stop has a chocolate maker that shows you the process of making chocolate in real time. Overall I thought the experience was worth taking the kids too. They had no complaints once the chocolate was in their hand.
For dinner that night, we walked to a place that was that was pretty close to the hotel called Nona Pizza. We sat outside under the Terrace so we were able to just park the stroller right next to the table. I was very impressed with the Neapolitan style pizza here and so was my son who is usually kind of picky when it comes to his pizza. Also down the street from Nona, they have a sister restaurant called Nona Pasta. We did not eat there, but from the looks of the full tables, the place probably would be worth the try.

Day 4: Bruges/Canal Cruise

Click here for the link for our day in Bruges.

If you do not want to navigate public transportation and want a guide, I would choose this tour, Bruges day trip from Brussels.

Day 5

On our final day in Brussels the weather kind of dictated our schedule as there was a high chance of rain for most of the day. We started by walking through the Botanical Garden because there was a public playground for the kids to play at. We knew we were going to be spending a lot of time indoors so we wanted our son to be able to stretch his legs a little bit. There was a school class there playing when we got there and they were all very friendly and started playing with our son fairly quickly.
We had lunch reservations at Cantina Valentina which was a short walk from the playground that the hotel we were staying at had recommended. This restaurant was also located in a hotel and had a place to park the stroller as well as high chairs. The recommendation was right on the money. The food was great, my husband stated the mussels were the best he had eaten thus far. They also had a house made beer that was worth going to try. Highly recommend the hummus to start with.
The rain was really coming down after lunch and it was our little ones nap time, so we located a beer hall called À La Mort Subite. This is considered one of the oldest Brussel cafes in city center. It was very spacious inside and we were able to just wheel our stroller right inside to our table. I had wine and my husband had beer. We also ordered a cheese plate that was very well put together. This was a nice spot to stop in to have a beer during a rainy day.
The Royal Gallery of Saint Hubert is a beautiful indoor shopping center conveniently located right across the street from A La Mort Subite. It includes a variety of shops. There are chocolate shops, luxury brands, stores with Belgian made goods, and my personal favorite, a bookstore. It is even home to a former Michelin star restaurant, Restaurant de l’Ogenblik.
De Noordzee was my husband’s must eat restaurant when we did dining research before our trip. It is a casual seafood cafe with mostly outdoor dining. There are a few covered tables and many tables outside under umbrellas. Places like this are perfect for us when dining with a baby. We just pull the stroller up beside the table. It was a little drizzly while we were there but we were all covered.
Initially, we ordered two entrees, shrimp and cod. Our son loved the cod so we ended up going back to order the shrimp croquettes. Personally, I love that the entrees come with a small salad on the side. However, if you are not a salad lover, be sure to order extra food or plan this to be an appetizer before going somewhere for a bigger meal.
This was our second trip to the Halles Saint- Gery since it is conveniently located across the street from our hotel. It was much busier than our afternoon visit. There was a projector playing the Euro cup. The frites shop was open and we got a huge bowl of family sized frites. Kids were running and playing in the open space. It was the perfect way to close out our last night in Brussels.
No trip to Brussels is complete without a picture in front of Manneken Pis.

FINAL DAY

Train to Amsterdam from Brussels with a baby and a toddler

For our last breakfast in Brussels, we ate at Dandy Bar and Kitchen. This restaurant was attached to our hotel. Luckily, they had a high chair so that made dining with a baby much easier. It was so easy to just go downstairs and have breakfast before gathering luggage to head to the train. I definitely recommend eating in your hotel or close by on travel days with a family.

Then we made our trek to Brussels Centraal to take the train back to Amsterdam. Highly recommend leaving extra time to get to the station as often times it can take a while to find the elevator to your exact train platform. It is much easier getting to train platforms when you do not have a stroller and luggage.

Brussels Day Trip Ideas with Kids

In addition to our trip to Bruges, we considered some other day trips from Brussels with kids.

There is actually a Legoland close by that would have been fun for our son. We considered taking him but did not want to ride the train multiple days in a row.

Mini Europe is another fun activity for kids in Brussels, but it was also a little further than we wanted to go from our hotel.

If you’re looking to check out another city while in Belgium, Ghent also looks like a beautiful city. It is actually closer to Brussels than Bruges so would be a great option if you do not want to be on the train as long. There are actually day trip options for tours that include Bruges and Ghent.

We would love to hear your favorite part of your trip to Brussels! Comment below!

Bon Voyage,

Our Crew