wrong... I am pretty good at maps and such like but to be honest I was a bit fazed by all the signs. However as luck would have it a group of obliging gendarm helped point me in the right direction. Well that's what I'd like to think they were doing as one of them was waving his baton from the other side of the central barrier shouting "Get Off... Get off" I don't think they got the Sheila sense of humour with me nodding grinning and pedalling as fast as I could away from them whilst thinking there was at least ten camp site fees in that there fine. So yes I was indeed on the road, just not the one I was supposed to be on.
Cycling through France was bliss. I am at home in such an expanse of skyline and land and the accompanying soltude it brings. But Belgium, now Belgium I have fallen in love with. It has such beautiful lush fertile countryside which is used at every opportunity in some agricultural pursuit. The goats looked happy on the side of the canal chomping foliage but the poor Ostrich just looked totally odd! But back to the landscape.
It all looked very familiar but as It is not a country I have visited before I was somewhat perplexed at this echo of something I seemed to know. And then, just as I was about to capture another stunning image of canals and willow trees on my phone it came to me. My wonderful Art teacher Mr Ormande and his books on Dutch and Flemish painters. Just such views I had looked at time and time again as an I colour plate in a book and now here they were now right in front of me. The colours and the light were perfect as were the reflections in the water of the canals. I was almost tempted to push open a house door to see if there was a Vermeer waiting inside but that might just excite more gendarmes. Forgive my mixing of countries and painters by the way but this just illustrates how little I really know of this part of Europe and it's culture.
Cycling through France was bliss. I am at home in such an expanse of skyline and land and the accompanying soltude it brings. But Belgium, now Belgium I have fallen in love with. It has such beautiful lush fertile countryside which is used at every opportunity in some agricultural pursuit. The goats looked happy on the side of the canal chomping foliage but the poor Ostrich just looked totally odd! But back to the landscape.
It all looked very familiar but as It is not a country I have visited before I was somewhat perplexed at this echo of something I seemed to know. And then, just as I was about to capture another stunning image of canals and willow trees on my phone it came to me. My wonderful Art teacher Mr Ormande and his books on Dutch and Flemish painters. Just such views I had looked at time and time again as an I colour plate in a book and now here they were now right in front of me. The colours and the light were perfect as were the reflections in the water of the canals. I was almost tempted to push open a house door to see if there was a Vermeer waiting inside but that might just excite more gendarmes. Forgive my mixing of countries and painters by the way but this just illustrates how little I really know of this part of Europe and it's culture. 
I managed to make my way to Ghent. But to get there I passed through the town's of Ypres and indeed Passendale. I found it quite disturbing trying to visualise the countryside as a battlefield and cycling along the lanes you have plenty of time to mull those big questions and pay silent homage to all those who died.
Campsite no 1. When arriving in the dark try to spend a little more time working out the lay of the land and the possible water logging of your pitch. That's right, I woke to pools of water collecting underneath. Well that wasn't really helped by the torrential rain that fell overnight and was waiting for me next morning.
1 comment:
Great blog She - I love it! I've only just got the link. Oh no, rain on the first night :(
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