5th. Went round to Giséle’s for the celebration of her birthday which was on the 3rd, Lovely evening with lovely woment, most of them from the development.
13th Finally got away today and caught up to where I should have been by now if I had left on time, ie: the 11th. It was a shame to have to rush but needs must.
The Aire at St Jean-sur-Mayenne was worth oushing through for. It is right on the river with boat moorings on the bankm no boats there at the mement. There are toilets and showers and nice hedged in shaded plots with individual electricity points and all this for Euro 12.55pn! Cassidy and I had a walk up to the unremarable village and then out along the tow path before settling in for the evening.
14th Liesurly departure this morning after a cold end to the night. It was an interesting 1st night. I knew I would miss the space that I had in the old van but this one is a real challenge. A whole new meeting to living in small spaces, which with 2 boats and one van I am not exactly a stranger to. Gradually moving stuff to more convienent homes and re-inforcing, if it was ever necessary, how important order is to comfort!
It was a lovelt drive through rolling countryside composed of farming and forrestry. Nice roads and not much traffic made the driving experience a pleasure. Lots of long hills and smooth turns.
The architecture has changed a lot and I really like the brown stone built hoiuses with their steep slate roofs. A big change from the style in CharentMarentime and indicative of harsher weather.
I had a lunch stop at a delightful pic-nic place in a winding gorge with high sides.
Decided to push on a bit further than originally planned and stop for the night at Pont-d’Ouillyas there was supposed to be electricity available, but that is sadly no longer the case. However the river frontage is delightful. Cassidy is renewing his delight in ducks!
15th Left early to avoid additional charges for the Aire! Drove to Falaise where I parked, along with a couple of other campers, under the walls of a William the Conquerer Castle. Spent some time looking around the town which has 2 churches
It being Monday and being France most shops and facilities were closed but it was good to see that Mandela is not forgotten even in this corner of France.
The castle enclosure is large and impressive as are the views from the ramparts.
Of course you can’t get awy from WW2 memorabilia so there is a museum and some hardware and also street hordeings. The four men on the right, having overseen the wholesale slaughter of hundreds of thousands are now deviding up the spoils!
There has been another change in the architectural style, this time to half timbered.
Finally arrived on the banks of the Siene opposite Rives-en-Siene then over the big bridge and down to the coast. I got to St-Valery-en-Caux in the late afternoon and as the Aire proved very difficult to get to because of road works I booked into a campsite for the electricity and a 2 day stay as a quick look at the port on the way through suggested it was worth exploring.
Rives- en-Siene
16th. After breakfast Cassidy and I walked down to the Port. The surrounding parts of town were not without charm
The port itself is large and has the appearance of a forest of masts
There is a lift bridge for boats to go out to sea and doubtless lots of “messing about in boats”
Like this bunch of kids going out for Optimist training (everyone should be obliged to train as an Optimist)
The cliffs on this side of the chanel are anything but white but the pebble beach is familier!
There was an interesting art instalation along the promenade where a photographer has given a modern take on an OLd Master, amusing
There were fishermen selling the mornings catch along the wuay. Iresisted buying as I do not want to stink the van out but we did stop for a calamari rings and frits lunch (Euro 13!) on the beach front. Cassidy had his rings without the batter!
A slow walk back up the hill for an afternoon of colating photos and sorting out e-mails, the blog, whatsapp messages and anything else that requires IT while we have power and signal.
A lovely late afternoon walk to local woodland
17th Reasonably early start to take the short drive to Le Tréport. The Aire was full and the town very busy, this is afterall the day before a long weekend! So French! But don’t get the idea that they are slackers just because they know how to enjoy life. Productivity in France is higher that in both UK and the USA! Just goes to show, treat folks right and they will perform better.
Parked the van and set off to explore, the “where to park for night” can wait.
The port is much bigger than that at St Valery, more industrial, deeper, bigger boats and a fleet of fishing trawlers.
There is a huge sea lock to enable the water level in the inner basin to be maintained when the tide is out.
The tidal basin at high tide is an impressive body of water.
outside the harbour walls are the beaches and cliffs
There is a fanicular that takes you up to the cliff top terrace, which is free to ride so up we went and the views were sectacular. Below on the right you can see the steps leading back down into the town. So having rode up we walked down.
There is am impresive church and some handsom town houses.
There is also another change in the architecture with more decorated brick work and the use of lots of flint.
Unable to find an Aire with electricity in Le Tréport I drove on to a little village, Bourseville, 12k away.
18th. Set off via the country roads for Bergues, last stop before Belgium. Another day of pleasurable driving. Although it is a publice holiday I was heading inland so most of the traffic was going the other way. Again a mix of agriculture, forest and rolling hills. As we get closer to “Flanders” there is evedence of the fact in the place names and the frequency of aritectual styles like Dutch Gable and Dutch Barn roof lines.
The Aire at Bergues is just outside the five star fort walls.
The tourist office was closed so I was unable to find out the size or the date of the occupation of the original fort. It is substantial though and can be dated reasonably reliably as sometime in the 1700s as this is when such forts were built. Possibly latter part of the centurary as it addition to being large it is also complex.
There are attractive main and postern gates, a donjon and what is labled as a “pointy tower”!
There is a bell tower in town which is ornate but sounds like an ice-cream van when it chimes.
Our late afternoon walk revealed more of this towns impressive defences. Between the Inner and outer walls is the moat, still clearlr disernable in places, and multiple tunnes to gain access. There is a firing wall with angles firing slots to cover approaches from all sides.
A C15 Nekertor for taking away dirty water, impressive for its epoch.
A further entry gate which may have been the original main entrance given that it sports a portculis and a drawbridge.
19th Got off to an early start and at some point crossed the border into Belgium and encountered the first windmill.
I had chosen the road less travelled so expexted the 80k drive to take about 2 hours as I was expecting open countryside and photo-opps. No such luck. Largely suburban sprawl with village after villagee and speeps frequently down to 30kph. However as we got closer to Brugge the traffic became intense with multiple tail backs and slow stop/start driving. The drive ended uo taking 5 hours and when I got to the Aire it was full so I had no option but to park in the adjascent bus park at Euro 55 pn. Found helen and Steve who rescued me from my exhaution with rosé and wild prawn rissoto. Lovely to see them, great meal and wonderful company.
20th. Got to the Aire entrance early this morning and managed to get in and find a good slot with space for Cassidy and I to sit out should we choose. Work this morning before heading back to H & S’s boat for a much needed shower!
Their boat and the marina of which Steve is harbour Master.
After a lovely meal we went for a walk aroind the town.
The top right is the tour boats in which one can take tours of the city from the canals. The middle a glympse into one of Brugge’s many secret courtyards and the one on the right is what would be known in England and Alms Houses
The evening light was particulaly pleasing.
The Florentines arrived in Brugge in the C14th bringing with them banking, modern trading practices and flouces and flourishes to liven up the austeer Northern architecture.
The bizaar mish-mash of styles on the top right was the Florentines Coucular building.
21st. More work in the morning but in the evening I took Helen and Steve out to an Indian restraurant and we had a spectcularly good meal.
22nd.Helen and I met up for another wander rounf town in search of a good coffee shop, Helen’s habitual one being closed on Mondays, and a sleeping bag so I can give Helen her blanket back. We failed on the sleeping bag so Steve is going to take me to decathlon this afternoon.
On 1sr June 1310, a woman was burned at the stake in Paris. She ws a wealthy and well educated woman was her sin was not witchcraft but heresy, specifically that she refused to retract the statement made in her book, ” The Mirror of The Simple Souls”. Her name was Marguerite Poréte. ssshe is one of the earliest Beguines of note. The Beguines were regarded by the establishment as a religious movement. However they were noy ordained and lthough they held with sexual abstinance many had previously been married and had children. They can be better understiood as women who prefered to remain single, live in a community and persue independant, active and economically useful lives. These communes were known as Beguinages and the buildings were usually painted white.
Their real threat to the establishment and the church was their indipendance and they were increasingly restricted to their Beguinages. The last Beguine died in 2013 acvcording to the historian Walter Simons of Dartmouth College which begs the question as to why “silence” notices are posted a regular intervals around the Beguinage in Brugge which as Simons states has become tourist attraction since the demise of the communitiy.
The square where the horses are watered.
THE TRIP TO |DECATHLON WAS SUCESSFUL AND THEN IT WAS TIME TO SAY GOODBYE. iT HAS BEEN LOVELY SPENDING TIME WITH SUCH GOOD FRIENDS AGAIN.
Steve on board JJ wearing the Apron I bought him.
23rd. An early start and a long and auduous day to drive from Brugge to Geertruidenberg and the Aire at the marina.
On our evening strole Cassidy and I encountered a flock of cranes
and other industrial parafinalia…this dispite being on the edge of the Biesbosch National Park.
24th. Nice cosy and quiet night but traffic started eraly in the morning and it was only 6 degrees when I woke up, fortunately I can turn the central heating on without getting out of bed! After breakfast I went across to the Harbour Masters office to talk to the lovely woman there who had advised me yesterday that if I did not have reservations for the weekend I should make them. Because it was going to be a long weekend Aires were expected to be very busy. We arrived at the solution that I should leave today and go and visit the medieval fortified village of Heusden not far away, spend 2 days there and come back to Geeeertruidenberg on Friday for the weekend.
Apart from unintentionally ending up on the hi-way for a couple of junctions, the 40k trip went well.
The Aire is large, new, shiney and quite lux. Euro 20 plus tourists taxes and electricity consummed. There are loos, showers and full bathrooms. Everything is well laid out and the individual site are a good size. My site faces onto the Maas canal and there is a lot of very large barge traffic passing on a regular basis. This one is carrying 32 shipping containers!
then behind me is the pleasure bost marina
On the walk into the village there is a handsome windmill
The village, which would have been regarded as a small town in the C17th when it was formally forified in the style of the 5 pointed starm in this case a 7 pointed star at least.
Even though there is a certain amount of built fortification, like Brugg, I suspect the town depended primarilary on water as its first line of defence.
There are also the ruins of a castle that was built into the taon walls, it now encloses a childrens play area.
Within the defences sits an attractive little town, more of which I will explore tomorrow. There are some really pleasant houses from the modest to the mansion.
A number of houses have comendeered the pavement in front of their houses, this being Holland it must be legal, while in other cases they are just he early brick pathways while the roads are all cobbled.
There is evedence of a jewish community in a street name and a building that for a period housed a Sinogogue.
There are many good examples of what is known as the “Dutch Gable”
There is a clock tower, this is above a municipal building and not related to a church. Another “difference” is in yhe way the bells are sounded. they are not peeled by being rocked by bell ringers pulling on roaps which cause the clapper to strike the shell of the bell. These bells are sounded by hammers that are made to strike the bell. This results in the sort of chimes that I somewhat scaithingly called “ice cream van” chimes!
Back at the van the sun was going down over the canal in font of me bringing an instresting day to its conclusion.
25th. I met a delightful Dutch woman at the washing up sink. She and her husband have retired to the Carabean, Dutch Antilies. We had a lovely conversation about being a stranger in a strange land as opposed to staying at home.
I decided that Cassidy and I would walk the walls this morning. Really delightful and so enlightening in terms of the towns defences. There was major hay making going on everywhere with fleets of mowers large and small all over the embankments.
Some of the star projections had canon in place facing all outward sides of the star. Historically they would all have had canon in place. In the centre that was a navigation aid similar to the Batholemue Dias crosses round Cape Point that are painted white on one side and black on the other, to indicate compass direction.
There were many more defencive walls and entry gates, towers and a double portcullis access to the town quay.
little lift bridges and windmills and in town basins…..
and then the town port and countryside beyond….
Then back to the van for lunch. Later in the afternoon Cassidy and I took a last walk to town and found the vismarkt/fish market where appropriately there was a fish stall, smelling very enticing, along with a fruit stall and a cheese staal. I bought some traditional Dutch waffle and honey biscuits in a lovely shop. The owner told me they were currently rated the 5th best shop in their catagory in Holland and were hoping to hear before the week was over that they had moved up to first place.
26th. Took a quick last walk into the village this morning before getting the van ready to return to Geertruidenberg. Just when you think you have seen all that there is to see you find something new.
Tucked away in a quiet quarter behind the market square is a haven of tranquility and childrens gardening project full of flowers, herbs, vegetables and wild areas. Complete with comfortable seating and even a swallow house.
The town basin had boats in it this morning.
A quick stop in the market square and the adjascent shopping street for a couple of photos without all the market vans before returning to the van and heading back to Geertruidenberg and another old “City” to explore.
After settling back into the Aire at Geertruidenberg we went off to explore the old town.There is a very impressive large open market square lined with Lime trees behind which are handsome, well restorred old houses. I was right about householders purloining pavement space and several were sitting outside their houses, drinking beer with their dog or reading!
There is not much evidence left of the walled city appart from the barely discernible star point with canon mounted and the powder magazine set in a protective earth burm which might or might not be another star point.
27th . Dog walkm van tidy and work this morning! Plus getting everything ready for and early departure tomorrow in the hope of beating the traffic!
28th.
Well we are in Holland – what did you expect!!!
A really hard day fom a navigating stand point. It is the last day of a long weekend which meant heavy traffic and getting lost multiple times. I did manage to inspect and photograph some of the missing Aires for Varcarious Books but othet than that and my first 3 Euro ferry experience, I do not have a lot to show for the day.
I arrived very late and tired on the norther shores of Veluwemeer where the Aire book had nothing to offer and paid Euro 50 for 2 nights in a rather rustic Aire but with stunning views. Too tired to care.
29th. After having been squeazed into a corner last evening I got a lake facing slot with plug in when some vans left this morning. Domestic and administrative things to deal with today.
However with good views form my water facing site and passing boats.
Later Cassidy and I went for a nice walk in some woodland.
I am enjoying Holland more than I did Belgium and one of the reasons was bought into shart relief when I was doing some route planning for the return journey to France. As soon as I crossed the boarder the map became hectically busy, almost a case of one city bleeding into the next town, into the next city etc. So what about the statistics to back up this empirical evedence. So how about these population density numbers. Number of residents for sq.K.
France 117
Holland 520
UK 715
Belgium 985
Table above also says something about why I chose to live in France rather than UK!
However driving in Holland is even more challenging than driving in Belgium, The plethora of waterways is handled by a superb network of free to travel motorways. No expence spared here on constructing the necessary bridges, tunnels etc to ensure swift passage for road traffic. The only problem being that as they are free it has been unecessary to also build a good network of alternatives to the motorway system. I personally see no point in visiting a country only to rush through it at 100kph (and believe me you will get all kinds of abuse if you try to drive any slower!) So it is convoluted by-waysm ferries and getting lost that usully mrke out my travels.
30th. Left after breakfast and Cassidy’s first walk for a liesurly 48k drive to Hesselt another delightful severn pointed star fortified Old Town.
But before we go into that I have to tell you about stopping for diesel and going thru the car wash. And before you sign and decide to skip this bit, here is a tale of AI in action! First the petrol pumps where I was greeted in French (French number plates – go figure) secondly it knew I wanted Dieselm this one less obvious? The I see there is a car wash next door and as the van is both new and dirty I thought I would just drive thru quickly but wanted to check my height vis the machine first so popped into the kiosk to ask. The attendant said, come with me I’ll ask the operator? Operator, what operator, don’t you just choose your option, pay with your card and drive in? Not here you don’t. There were two attendants who gave the van a hand pre-wash, wheel hubs the lot. Then one of them guided my near side front wheel onto a conveyer belt and told me to put the vehicle in neutral and leave the hand break off. The van is then conveyed thru series of liquids and brushes until I am confronted by what looks like a pretty solid structure which has writen bold across it (I kid you not) “Don’t worry I am a gentle cow”. Well that was the dryer. New pins have nothing on the shiny new look van that drove out the other end! and all for Euro 10. I have to find another one of these to go thru before I leave Holland and this time not to be so gob smacked that I can’t take some photos on the way thru, in the very least of the “gentle cow”.
Parked up in a spacious new Aire in one of the points and Cassidy and I had a brief explorartory tour of the town and some lunch. The Dutch “Pannenkoek” equivelend of the FrenchCrepe but way thicker, garnished with ham, apple, mushrooms and cheese, was way more than I could eat so half of it came back to the van for tomorrow!
There were a few remaining vestiges of the old walls
A great example of the Dutch “Occupy the Pavement” movement, down to sun blinds!
There was a small canal that ran thru the town with little lift bridges where it encountered a road and some very handsome old houses. In size it is little more than a village but since it was granted town status in the C13th, who am I to argue.
I went back on my own in the afternoon so that I could go into the Old Town Hall, recomended by the woman I spoke to there this morning and into the church, home via the corner store.
For our evening walk we visited the windmill (I did warn you!) and the dykem then swung by the yatch basin to see if the old Aire was still the same as the description in the Aire book.
31st May, Wednesday. This morning we walked through the park, a mini forest of Oak, Chestnut and Beach ( and probably a few more besides which I did not identify) and along the canal to the Lime kilns.
I was invited in and given a cup of coffee and shown two films with explanations, as best as he was able in English, by the lovely Johan of what was going on. The first film, a scratchy black and white was shot in 1946 and Johan pointed out two men who he claimed were his Father and Grandfather. The kilns were apparently built in the 1500’s and last saw service at the time that the second film was shot in the 1990’s. Shells were bought up from the coast on barges and the finished bags of cement shipped out the same way.
When I left Johan gave me a post card and a marker. A charming interlude well worth the Euro 3 entry .
Having realised that the Euro 30 spent on a so-called USB computer charger was not going to work I have had my eyes open for alternatives and came across an IT shop in town where a very helpful young man sold me a mini interter designed for just such eventualities. I can charge the computer with the inverter plugged in to the cig lighter while driving so that I do not deplete the battery while I am simultaneiously charging the phone via the van’s USB outlet.
capetocarpe 