Inhabitants of Belgium's cobblestone-and-canal city of Bruges are clear: summertime tourism has hit capacity."Bruges is often referred to as a mass tourism destination, but it isn't," a spokeswoman, Ann Plovie, tells AFP.
- Tourism strategy -
"This is like a bit (of a) misconception that the city is overcrowded.
yeah. we took a basketball team from the nba once. didn t work out well. laughter what would you feel, how would you feel, if a family from ghent got your slot on the canals? huh. yeah, well, i wouldn t feel great. to get a sense of how important it s always been for locals to control and protect the canals, a new vr experience lets you visualise this city back in the medieval days, and i even get to sit in a wooden boat. it s so magical to be transported back six, seven centuries to when that rivalry between bruges and ghent first started. i love this. it s so immersive. i ve got to watch my head. low bridges! apparently, there are still examples all around the city about that rivalry, and i vejust the man to show me them.
you were wondering probably are we still stealing things from each other, bruges and ghent? well, now, it s actually people. yes, it s. well, we re taking tourists, but they re taking all our creative people. so the water very important to this city. yeah, absolutely. because it used to be a port where boats arrived from all over the world carrying spices, exotic birds, cloth, everything. and what we had here to sell, it was put on a boat and exported all over the world. as you can see now, we re still loading and unloading things. it s no more. it s no longer cloth or spices. we re unloading and reloading tourists. i used to live in this street. it has 1a chocolate shops. wow. this is the guild house of the shoemakers. that was then. now, they do other stuff in this house. you see that medieval building next to that building with the compass on, on the right side, with the little tower? yeah. that was built in 1952. yeah, my dad is older than that. you have to be honest. bruges is
andy murray not too many surprises. nice to see andy murray doing not too many surprises. nice to see andy murray doing well not too many surprises. nice to see andy murray doing well again. - not too many surprises. nice to see andy murray doing well again. that| andy murray doing well again. that is the spot- andy murray doing well again. that is the spot. you andy murray doing well again. “inst is the spot. you can follow the ashes online, five explores extra, highlights on bbc two every evening so all kinds of ways to keep in touch with the ashes. time now for the travel show. hello and welcome to the travel show from bruges in belgium. coming up on this week s programme the families fighting to keep tradition afloat. if you open it up like amsterdam or venice, that would kill the charm. ..the woman proving there s no one size fits all traveller. i wanted to talk to you about being a plus sized person who loves to travel. ..and taking swimming to the extreme in west a
in 2028, they re going to open up the market. bruges is beautiful because it is contained. and if you open it up, like amsterdam or venice, that would kill the charm. as part of the changes coming in, all the boats operating on the bruges canal will need to become electric. we ve been investing in electrical boats, which costs about, i don t know, about 300,000 euros a boat. so we have to invest in two more. we already have two. i don t know any people who would invest, we ll call it a million euros, and not being sure that you ll be able to still do the job. i mean, we re proud of what we ve achieved and what we re doing here as a job. so i m trusting that the city sees that and wouldn t kick us aside. you can see some blood splatters towards the end, if you look. have you ever had any accidents?