3 Days In Brussels With Kids: A FUN Brussels Vacation For Families

Where To Stay in Brussels With Kids

Brussels can be a bit tricky to plan when you’re trying to keep your family travel on a budget. Brussels was one of the more expensive places we’ve stayed- with exception perhaps to Paris. (See our tips for visiting Paris here!) For example, we spent about $20-30 per person in most places for dinner in Brussels. But the experience was an activity in itself! 

To keep your family travels more affordable, staying outside the city center might be a better option. We stayed fairly central and actually got a great deal on Booking.com for a 2 bedroom apartment right near The Mint and Place de Brouckere. This is probably a good time to mention that I have a fantastic article about booking great family hotels on a budget. *wink wink*

In my opinion, Brussels is a VERY walkable city with lots of things to do. There’s a wide variety of both indoor activities Brussels has to offer, as well as outdoor activities. And of course, some of our adventures in Brussels with kids were free! So splurging a bit to stay in the city center is definitely worth it. 

However, you can save some money -AND- stay in a beautiful area called Louise. It’s a peaceful area that’s great for kids.  The Catalonia Brussels Hotel is right along the Metro line and you can reach the Grand Place in the city center via the 92 Metro in just 15 minutes or so. And TripAdvisor actually has a fantastic list of the best family-friendly hotels as well!

Because our Brussels vacation fell over the New Year’s holiday, everything was still decorated for Christmas. This definitely helped make our 3 days in Brussels feel a bit more magical.

Even though we stayed during the holidays, there were plenty of fun things to do in Brussels with kids that were NOT holiday related. In fact, I think only one afternoon of our activities was really ‘Christmas-y’. The rest of our Brussels activities can be done any time of the year. 

So now that I’ve got all that out of the way, let’s dive into all the great places in Brussels to visit on your family’s Brussels vacation! 

Day one of our 3 days in Brussels vacation was awesome! Since we were so lucky to find a great flat on Booking right in the center, we were only a few minutes walk from the Grand Place, which is like the main plaza. 

The Grand Place has incredible architecture and elaborate decor both inside and outside of the buildings. The Hôtel de Ville de Bruxelles is the Brussels town hall in the plaza. It will absolutely take your breath away. 

Since looking at old buildings isn’t usually high on the list of fun things to do in Brussels with kids, we had a special trick up our sleeve to really make our first Brussels activities a blast! 

We found a very fun (and super affordable) audio tour game on Viator that starts right at the Grand Place. The game really brings the city to life and makes exploring Brussels super fun for the kids! It was so fun I now plan to look for a game like this in every big city we visit! 

I also have a great (and totally FREE) street art scavenger hunt game you can download to use right on your phone in any big city as well! Activities like this can really elevate your family vacation and add a LOT of fun. The best part is that they help keep you on budget when planning your Brussels 3 day itinerary! (And make room in your wallet for more fun stuff!)

For breakfast, you can dip down one of the little side streets off the plaza to find the Sister Brussels Cafe. It’s all organic and has some great gluten-free waffles and vegan options for breakfast. Since my husband is gluten-free, we’re often looking for places that can accommodate everyone- which is tricky when your kids are picky eaters!

We typically keep a small supply of yogurts and pastries in our hotel/flat on any vacation, and then will often eat a later brunch style breakfast as we explore. (You can get all my best family travel on a budget tips in this post!)

There is also a great Brussels City museum right in the plaza, called Musee de la Ville de Bruxelles. It has a wide variety of statues/sculptures, artwork and beautiful stained glass displays inside. You can spend an hour here just learning more about the city of Brussels.

If you’re only doing a day trip to Brussels (or even a 2 day Brussels itinerary) I would probably skip this museum. It is definitely one of the cooler places in Brussels to visit if you have the extra time, however. 

For families, the Royal Puppet Theater (Théâtre Royal de Toone) is a fun and quirky way to enjoy a more medieval Brussels with kids. It has a puppet/marionette museum with classic wooden puppet shows in the evenings. It’s a VERY cool place to visit and explore! Its entrance is tucked away down an alley and you truly feel like stepping back into the 15th century when you visit. 

I suggest visiting in the early afternoon (3 or 4pm) before the pub gets busy, for a more kid-friendly experience. This way you can explore the puppet museum and grab some drinks from their pub, getting a nice break from the outside world. 

Normally, we would stop at a grocery store or mini-market for easy lunch food. Unfortunately we didn’t see one during our Grand Place explorations, so we ended up continuing our medieval experience by having dinner at a restaurant called Le Roy d’Espagne.

Le Roy d’Espagne was beyond cool, with a horse statue inside the entrance and a lot of amazing decor. The inside is actually much larger than we thought and had plenty of space for our big family. (Score!) There was also a wide variety of food on the menu, including burgers, and vegan options as well. 

It wasn’t originally on my list of places in Brussels to visit, but I was SO GLAD we stumbled across it! The restaurant was an awesome experience in itself. (Although, to be fair, I felt like this was true for many of our Brussels activities!)

We ended up returning to our flat after dinner, stuffed, happy, and pretty darn tired! LOL

Day 1 of our 3 Days in Brussels Recap:

• Breakfast at the Sister Brussels Cafe
• Exploring Grand Place (main plaza) with the awesome audio tour game
• Peeking into the Brussels Town Hall and the city museum 
• Royal Puppet Theater
• Dinner at Le Roy d’Espagne

On Day 2 of our Brussels 3 day itinerary, we had a bit more freedom to explore the city.  Since we didn’t have a fun game to lead the way, we decided to let our teen girls choose our Brussels activities for the morning. 

Since our flat was located right next to The Mint, we started there. The Mint is an indoor shopping mall, and our older girls had been eyeing it since we’d first arrived for our Brussels vacation!

Sometimes when planning our vacation activities, I tend to forget that a good old shopping trip is peak teen fun. So it wasn’t on our list of things to do in Brussels with kids, but hey! What can you do? LOL!!

Anyhow, after about an hour of ‘shopping’ we grabbed a delightful pastry breakfast at the mall and moved on. Little did we know, shopping would turn into the theme of our day. At least for the next hour or two…

There are a few breathtakingly beautiful ‘indoor’ alleys in the Brussels city center, and we ended up going into one just off the Rue de l’Eveque.

There was a lovely domed ceiling which had been decorated to highlight Brussels at Christmas. Even without the decorations, it was gorgeous inside! 

There is an amazing chocolate/candy shop in that indoor alley called Delices Du Roy. It’s not very big, but it was decorated beautifully! Our kids enjoyed picking out gifts for friends and family back home to share our Brussels vacation experience with! 

Our next stop was the Brussels Comics Figurines Museum. This is next to the Galerie Horta. Both the comics museum and the art gallery are great Brussels activities, but we try to keep our family travel as kid-focused as possible. 

The Comics museum was super fun, and there’s a great Smurfs-themed gift store next to it. Our kids, of course, LOVED the museum and the gift shop. (We love comics and nerdy stuff, so it was a shoe-in.) It’s one of the best indoor brussels family activities, and can be done year-round. Especially when trying to find fun places in Brussels to visit without crushing your travel budget.

As lunch approached, we went up to the Mont des Arts area. This is a great spot to let the kids run in the open space and play. They have beautiful gardens and lots of sculptures to see. 

We also took advantage of the nearby Carrefour Express and grabbed a picnic lunch to eat in the shady, grassy area across the street.

We typically try to squeeze in lots of stops at parks and playgrounds on our family vacations. And our Brussels 3 day itinerary was no different.

But to be honest, we didn’t stumble upon many actual playgrounds on our Brussels vacation. (If you know of some, please comment below and share them with us!) 

If you’re looking for free things to do in Brussels with kids, Mont des Arts is a lovely way to spend a few hours in the sunshine!

After lunch, we continued in a wide circle through the city. (We’d tackled the center yesterday, after all!) Along the way, we stopped to admire the Mannekin Pis statue. It was WAY smaller than we expected from seeing it on tv- but it was cute! 

If it’s already not on your path, however, I probably wouldn’t suggest making the effort to go see it if you’re experiencing Brussels with kids. It’s not one of the most exciting places in Brussels to visit. It’s crowded and our kids didn’t really care either way about it. (I would especially skip it if you’re trying to plan things to do in Brussels in 2 days instead of 3!)

That being said, our next activity made the very TOP of our list of fun things to do in Brussels with kids…

Next up on our Brussels 3 day itinerary was the Chocolate Museum. Its actual name is the Choco-Story Brussels, and it surpassed our expectations x100!! There is a candy making workshop which is super fun, or you can do the regular self-guided tour instead, which is a bit cheaper.

Our kids loved learning about the history of Chocolate and sampling the different types of chocolate. There’s also a hilariously fun virtual photo area which brings chocolate making to life for the kids. (Okay, okay, even us adults were having fun with the photos!) 

In fact, it was such a HUGE hit with our family that I wrote an entire post about our Choco Story Brussels Chocolate Tours experience!

I didn’t really expect this to be such a fun activity, but it really made our Brussels vacation with kids more fun. We’ve even joked about going back to Belgium just to visit this museum and come back home! LOL!!

The day’s fun wasn’t quite over yet, however. After spending about an hour and a half at the chocolate museum, we headed back towards our flat. 

We stumbled upon a comic book store called Brüsel, which has Harry Potter decor and lots of HP-themed items for sale. We had some fun going up to the top story and taking a few photos with the decor. 

When researching the address for this post, I discovered that it’s almost impossible to find on Google Maps! So here’s the direct google maps link as well as their website so you can check it out! They’re located at Boulevard Anspach 100 in Brussels. (Just in case.)

I also found this adorable bookstore called Le Wolf for younger kiddos when doing all my Google-ing. It has the most adorable (and magical!) forest decor inside! We will definitely be adding it to our list of places in Brussels to visit next time we come!

By now, everyone was getting pretty hungry for something besides Chocolate, so we stopped at the Drug Opera restaurant.

Honestly, we picked this place because the architecture and holiday decor was AMAZING! It seemed like the perfect place to eat when visiting Brussels with kids.

We were happy to discover that the inside of the Drug Opera was just as cool as the outside! There were multiple stories and it had a classic wood interior that was elaborate, but not as medieval as the restaurant from the day before.

If you’re spending 3 days in Brussels, you will definitely enjoy visiting both places for two very different Belgian restaurant experiences. 

After dinner, we went back to the flat to relax and gear up for the next day.

Recap Day 2 Of Our Brussels Activities:

• Explored the Mint Brussels and indoor alley shopping
• Stopped at the candy/chocolate shop called Delices Du Roy
• Explored the Brussels Comics Figurines Museum
• Played and picnicked at Mont des Arts 
• Saw the Mannekin Pis (famous sculpture)
• Visited the Brussels Chocolate Museum (aka Choco-Story Brussels) 
• Ate at Drug Opera restaurant

Brief Disclaimer About Day 3

Here’s where I get to be fully transparent and tell you that we actually planned 4 days in Brussels. We had originally planned to take a gorgeous day trip to Bruges on day 3. Bruges is said to be a beautiful small town that feels like stepping back in time.

We didn’t actually get to experience the beauty of Bruges because 5 of us had woken up in the middle of the night with the worst illness we’d ever experienced. I’m not going to gross you out with the details, but new underwear was purchased after this trip, STAT!!

One of the worst things about traveling with kids is that you will almost certainly, at some point, get sick. Anyhow, our ticket was up and it was our turn, I suppose!

So day 3 of our Brussels vacation was a total flop, spent being miserable in our flat. Cue day 4, which will henceforth be known as Day 3, because Day 3 no longer exists. 

Our next day in Brussels was definitely not what we had expected, both good and bad! LOL! Our original plan for the day was to take the metro down to the Atomium museum. This was about a 45 minute trip, including transfers and a small bit of walking at the end.

We had seen a lot of hype about the Atomium being really fun for kids. It was very futuristic and the pictures looked fun and colorful. Unfortunately, we only spent about 30 to 45 minutes here, including our time at the cafe and getting a picture with TinTin in the gift shop. 

I’ll go into more detail about our experience in the Atomium in my article about the best Brussels family activities. But if you’re planning a family trip to Brussels with kids, you can probably skip this attraction completely. It’ll save yourselves half a day. (And some cash.)

Nevertheless, there was a little bit of snow on the ground when we got to the park surrounding the Atomium.

Naturally, being Florida-raised, our kids were STOKED to be able to run and play in the cold winter weather. 

We all had a lot of fun exploring the Parc d’Osseghem Laeken, and we got LOTS of awesome photos while soaking up the fresh, crisp winter air. You can see the sheer joy on my kids’ faces, so I’d say our trip to the Atomium was a success in the end. 

(But since we do try to keep our family travel on a budget, skipping the Atomium and heading directly to the park would have been less stressful!) 

After heading back to our flat, we enjoyed a nice lunch at a restaurant near our flat called Le Grand Cafe. It was more modern, with two stories of seating inside. (Yay for plenty of space for our big family!) 

The food was fantastic and their service was prompt and friendly as well. And of course, the best part was that their prices were fairly reasonable. So I felt a bit better about wasting a bunch of money to see the Atomium. Haha!!

With our bellies full of good food, we took a mid-afternoon break back in the warmth of our cozy flat. Then we headed back out to explore the city’s amazing Christmas Markets as the sun went down.

I also have an entire article about the Brussels Christmas Markets, so I won’t drag this part on a whole lot. Especially since your Brussels vacation might not be during the holiday season. I want you to have a great 3 day itinerary for exploring Brussels with kids ANY time of the year!

Anyhow, the Brussels Christmas Markets are little shops, vendors, and decorations spread throughout the city. I had expected one large location where everything was put together (like a fair or carnival). So it was a pleasant surprise to see how much stuff there was to explore throughout the city.

Part of our fun was riding the Brussels Ferris Wheel, aka Grand Roue, which is open all year round. You can get a beautiful view of the city center from the top of the ferris wheel! This view was especially magical with the snowy rooftops. 

If you’re planning to spend 3 days in Brussels, I would definitely recommend visiting the ferris wheel no matter what time of the year you visit. It adds magic to your Brussels activities whether it’s day or night. (Especially if you’re vacationing in Brussels with kids- kids LOVE ferris wheels!)

Last Day Recap Of Our 3 Days In Brussels Vacation:

• Visited the Atomium Museum
• Played & explored the Parc d’Osseghem Laeken 
• At lunch at Le Grand Cafe
• Toured around the Brussels Christmas Markets & ferris wheel 
• Dinner at various market stalls

Takeaways From Our Brussels Vacation With Kids 

One of the biggest regrets I had during our Brussels 3 day itinerary was not planning a tour in advance. I usually have some sort of tour, excursion, or workshop planned in most big cities we visit. And to be fair, we were going to have that day trip to Bruges… 

But there are so many fun things to do in Brussels with kids that I do remember wishing we’d had more time. And I DEFINITELY wish we had planned to include this fun (vegetarian friendly!) walking food tour to bring the city to life. (The walking food tour we took in NYC was amazing, if you want to read about that here!) Or even just a delicious waffle making class would have been a blast for our kids.

Either way, we really LOVED our Brussels vacation! We definitely want to go back to Brussels again to explore more of their amazing architecture, food, and family fun. No matter how many days in Brussels you’re planning to spend, you really will have a wonderful time!

If there was something fun YOU experienced in Brussels with kids, or if you want to hear more about something WE did on our 3 day itinerary, comment below! I love sharing the fun of vacations with you guys! 

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