Mechelen and Hotel Carolus

[Edit: A couple of crappy photos here]

We spent 3 nights in Mechelen at the Hotel Carolus. It is attached to and part of Het Anker brewery.

Our hotel room looked right out over the brewery yard. There is a lovely pub and restaurant attached to the brewery. We drank a few pints of what they had.

We had:

• Gouden Carolus Ambrio. An ok amber. Not a big fan of ambers, but this was nice.
• Triple. This was on tap. This is a very nice beer. I drank ALOT of this.
• Classic. Which was also kind of an amber. Almost a tweener beer between a classic british amber and a blonde.
• Margrit. This was a citrus-y, sort of a wit style beer. Very drinkable. light-ish in alcohol (maybe 4.5?)

We had multiple rounds of these, both at the brewery and elsewhere in town over the 3 nights.

One of the nice things for me about staying at the hotel was the smell of the wort. Anyone who has brewed beer, or been around beer being made, knows the smell of wort. (It is basically unfermented beer). The smell is sweet and heady. A great smell if you love beer. It was a constant background smell at the hotel.

In town itself, we started at der Akker. This is a student and “artsy folk” kind of pub. (ie: cheap). Mechelen is a university town. We drank more Carolus.

From there we went to t Ankenjte where we drank more Carolus. Kind of a one beer town.

Then we wandered over to d’Afspraak and drank La Choufee and Postel Tripple – slightly malty and floral. BIG flavor and nose.

There seems to be a style of pub in Mechelen (and maybe other parts of Belgium) that are referred to as “Praat”. You will see a pub listed as Food and Praat. Some place are listed as Art and Praat. One place was listed as Piano, Mon,Wed,Fri, and “Praat” the rest of the week.

The best I could figure out from context and seeing the word in other contexts is that praat means it is a “chatting” pub. A place where one goes to chat with friends. In other words, no loud music. Some places has “praat gardens” that were quieter than inside the pub. A neat concept.

From there we went to the last “must see” place on my list. The “Den Stille Genieter”.

I don’t know how to describe this place, or the owner. It is a dark place, PILED high with old newspapers, and holiday decorations from Christmas, and Halloween, from who knows what year. The gentleman that owns the place is rather taciturn. I ordered 2 beers and when he brought them, he held them up and shrugged his shoulders as if to say “which beer goes where?”. Rather OCD/aspergers/autistic.

In addition to this, the man casts an odd spell of his bar, none of my pictures came out worth a damn. But I did find a reference to the place online. But enough of the ambiance! What did we drink?

Welllll,

• Westvleteren 6
• Westvleteren 8 They were both beautiful and served at just about the perfect temp 45-50 F. If you don’t know, these are some of the rarest beers, outside of belgium. And even in Belgium, I was only able to purchase them at 2 or 3 places. The monks make a very limited supply. The 8 has some slight spice with a bit of chocolate to it.
• Cuvee de Bouillon – I have no notes here for this
• Westvleteren 12. This is a BIG beer. about 10% alcohol, rather complex. They are so hard to find in the US that this was a little slice of heaven.

And when I paid the bill, the total was 12.25Euro. That is RIDICULOUSLY cheap. Ahh. I could live in Mechelen.

All kidding aside, it would not be a bad place to live. It is a smallish town, on the quiet side. But the university keeps it lively enough during the school year and it is about a 1/2 hour by train to Brussels. If I were ever to be so “lucky” as to land a job in the EU parliament (snork) or work for NATO, I would live in Mechelen and commute to Brussels.

I spent the next day in bed. I never really got up. It wasn’t really a hangover, i think it was just trip fatigue. I slept away the day. A waste I know, but it could not be helped.

We did have a lovely dinner at the Hotel Carolus pub, along with more of their beer (of course)

Finally, we had to leave for Brussels.