The last hour of yesterday's walk was one of two very brief times on this trip when I truly did not enjoy our journey. We had to walk on a narrow but busy road - drivers seemed to have little regard for us and cut it very fine, leaving dangerously little room when passing. Also a very strong wind had come up and we had to walk under some fragile looking trees - and my foot was hurting. When we eventually got to the only hotel in the area, we had to make such an inconvenient detour for, it was not exactly the Ritz.
This morning everything looked different again, with a blue sky and the sun was shining (we have been incredibly lucky with the weather – for the last week it has only rained just after we reached our hotel for the day or at night). We quickly found a very pleasant off road cycling way that would take us back to the Ghent – Bruges canal. In fact today was the most pleasant walk we have completed since we entered Belgium. The canal was lined by mature trees and fields, for a while there was even a proper non tarmacked walk way for us walkers only. *bliss*
On the way we met to lovely Australian ladies who were cycling across the Netherlands and now Belgium. They were going to Maastricht, the same way we have come west, they are going east. So I dug deep in my rucksack and got out the Chinese Menu style cycle maps we had used, explained the secret of how it works and let them have our maps. Hope they come in useful!
We arrived in Bruges in good time and fell in love immediately. We had to cross the 'Grote Markt' on our way to our hotel. It was as impressive as we have seen in so many other Belgian towns.
But here they have equally beautifully restored buildings away from the main square and canals to boot. Tres romantic, Paris and Venice eat your heart out!
Gary has already decided that we are going to do the full tourist programme tomorrow (he might have to take the canal boat trip in those bright orange buckets on his own though). I am looking forward to taking the camera out and getting some arty pictures.
Today's song choice is dedicated to Gary's mother Lily who today was admitted to hospital to receive a blood transfusion. She has been wonderfully supportive and encouraging throughout our walk and we had to promise hand on heart that we were not coming home early because of her. Honest Lily it is for purely selfish reasons that we chose shorter routes. Our feet and aching bones can be quite persuading.
Gary mentioned this Abba song once before but it was not chosen. Lily you ARE a Super Trooper.
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