Leuven, Brussels, Belgium

[TEE JAY]

We are thinking of going to Brussels or preferably Leuven (20 mins from Brussels) for long weekend in a couple of weeks. Anyone know of any companies that do flights to here? Preferably from Stansted. Or what is the best (and not to expensive) way of getting there. Dont want to spend days travelling as we only planned on having three or four days at the most!

Oh - and does anyone know of any reasonably cheap semi decent hotels?

Thanks

[arty7774]

There are no flights from Stanstead to anywhere in Belgium. I have to fly to Eindhoven and Travel by trian when I go to visit my friends over there

[arty7774]

Have you thought of travelling by Eurostar?

[Buenchico]

(Posted in 2 parts):

VLM fly from London City to Brussels:
http://www.flyvlm.be/

American Airlines, British Airways and SN Brussels Airlines fly from Gatwick to Brussels:
http://www.americanairlines.be/
http://www.british-airways.com/
http://www.flysn.com/

The same three airlines also operate to Brussels from Heathrow as well as Air Canada, Air New Zealand, bmi, United Airlines and Virgin Atlantic:
http://www.aircanada.ca/
http://www.eu.airnz.com/default.htm
https://www.flybmi.com/
http://www.ual.be/
http://www.virgin-atlantic.com/

[Buenchico]

(2nd Part):

Flights from Birmingham are operated by American Airlines, British Airways and SN Brussels Airlines (links as above). Additional operators from Birmingham are Finnair, Swiss International Airlines and TAP Air Portugal:
http://www.finnair.com/
http://www.swiss.com/
http://www.tap.pt/

There are also flights from East Midlands airport operated by bmi (as above) and Austrian Airlines:
http://www.aua.com/

As has been stated there are no flights direct from Stansted.

As has been suggested your best route is probably via Eurostar. The total journey time from Waterloo to Leuven is about 3hours 20 minutes. Tickets to Brussels include free onward travel to any destination within Belgium. With a much shorter check-in time at Waterloo than at most airports and no time spent at 'baggage reclaim' or customs at the other end, Eurostar probably offers the shortest total journey time:
http://www.eurostar.com

Rail timetables for the whole of Europe are available on the German Rail website, here:
http://reiseauskunft.bahn.de/bin/query.exe/en
(Note that this site can combine timetables across different countries. You can put in, say, Norwich to Leuven and it will plan your whole journey).

Hotels in Leuven are lited on the Leuven tourism website:
http://www.leuven.be/showpage.asp?iPageID=2721

Hoping something here helps,

Chris

[SteveD]

VLM also fly from London City to Antwerp from where you could get a train to Leuven.