Delerium Brewery Visit

  IAESTE Gent organized a trip to the Delirium brewery, and it was one of the best tours I have been on in my life.

  The tour started with a short video explaining the history of the brewery. After that video, the guide brought us to where the old brewery was and showed us the old equipment. Then we went to go see the actual brewery and where the brewmasters sit and stuff like that. The guide also explained how they are trying to limit the amount of water they use, and just how they work to be more efficient in their production.

  Next, our guide showed us the bottling and keg filling areas. These places are almost entirely automated, so there are not many people who work in those areas. For the filling area, only two people are needed to look after production.

  Our guide also showed us the warehouse, photos are at the end of the post, and it was massive. There were all different kinds of beer, bottle sizes, and they were marked to go to many different countries. There was a couple of stacks set to go to Canada, and the photos of that are shown at the end. During this part, we also had a chance to pick up a party keg to buy for 20 euros later, and I picked out the La Guillotine one.

  The last part of the tour was the best. It was the one hour of free beer time, and I made sure to make that hour count. I had 6 different beers, the last one was only a half beer, and those beers were Floris Kreik, Avorborden, Delirium Argentum, a coconut beer, the banana Delirium, and campus premium. The coconut tasting beer was also drunk from a coconut, which I thought was cool. After this, we also got a chance to buy merchandise, so I purchased a Delirium pink elephant hat.

  After the tour, the group went to a park to have some pizza which was nice too.

Photos of The Delirium Warehouse

Antwerp City Tour

  This tour was organized by Ellen, and it went to many great places in Antwerp. We first all met at Antwerp Berchem (a train station). Then we walked around some and saw some cool buildings and some hippies on bikes. There was one intersection that was especially interesting as it was the same at every corner building except each had a different picture on it to represent the four different seasons. Next, we hopped on a bus and went to a different part of the city.

  At this part of the city, we saw the Central Station which was terrific. It is a gigantic station with very high ceilings that looked very cool. The high ceilings were useful back when steam was used to power trains since it let the steam rise up out of the way. I have included a few photos at the end, so it is easier to picture what the station looks like. The zoo was right next to the train station, and we got to see flamingos there (the rest of the zoo was not free😞).

  We also got to see a museum about the history of diamonds (https://www.visitantwerpen.be/en/shopping-and-fashion-en/diamond-city/diva-antwerp-home-of-diamonds-501562-en). There was information about why Antwerp is involved in diamonds so much, and where in the world has diamonds. There was also some exhibits about were else precious metals are used in the world (such as cell phones). It was an interesting museum, but it would be nicer if they had more real information available instead of the mostly fictional stories they had.

  Ellen also took us to go eat some waffles. These waffles were delicious, and they were a different type of waffle, but I forget what it was called. She also pointed out to us the two tallest buildings in Antwerp (KBC Tower and the cathedral). We also climbed to the top of a different museum to see the panorama view of Antwerp. The view was great, and it was easy to see all of Antwerp. I have included some photos at the end of the post.

  After all this, almost everyone was tired, since a bunch of us were out late the night before, so most of us got on a train back to Gent.

Photos of Central Station

Photo of the panorama view