England

Hi everyone! It's been a little while since our last post so here's a bit of a run down of what we've been up to since Belgium.

We caught the train from Calais to Folkstone on Tuesday last week and spent the next week driving along the south coast of England towards Cornwall. The weather has lived up to the cliché, being highly changeable to say the least. We have had a few nice days here though which certainly helped make the photos look a lot nicer, and made the sightseeing much more enjoyable.

The landscape is beautiful. There are the same vivid greens of the Netherlands and Belgium but with lots of coastline and hills and cliffs too. The old fishing villages built into the sides of cliffs, the narrow and overgrown country roads, the hedgerows criss-crossing green rolling hills; these are the classic, stereotyped images of the English countryside and they are spot on.

We've stayed at a few great spots over the last week. Greenhill Farm in New Forest was a beautiful camping area with plenty of wildlife, and Edgemoor, a paddock made available to campers by a local farmer, just out of St. Austell, was a lush shade of green and very quiet. 

The UK is quite a bit bigger, geographically, than we'd thought.  And that's changed our plans slightly.  It looks like we'll end up hanging around here for an extra week so we have time to head north to Scotland before we get the train back to France.

On Monday we drove to London from Ilfracombe via Stonehenge, (which isn't quite as big as I'd imagined it.) It's been great to spend the last few days with Chris and Sarah, and especially have them show us around the big smoke yesterday.  London really is big.  It's going to be fun seeing some more of the sights with them over the next few days.

That's all for now, more soon.

Chimay, Brussels and Bruges

This week in Belgium has really been about beer tasting and food...

In Bruges, we relaxed with books on the side of the canal before dinner

A massive beer shop in Bruges, that boasted a 'beer wall' containing each of the different beers of belgium and the correct glass to drink it with.

The fruit beers go down well with the women here, this was 'framboise' and delicious! Though too sweet to drink often.

It was about thirty degrees, and so good to get out of the sun and into 'Brugs Beertje.' At the other pub we went to (at which you had a choice of 400 Belgium beers) we ordered a cold nibbles platter. What we got was a plate full, and I mean full, of sausage, chunks of pate, prosciutto, bacon and chunks of cheese...more meat than I've eaten in weeks!

Brussels, massive city, we got a bit lost. But we also got to go to a proper flea market. To quote Fran from Black Books, they 'do sell a lot of W...'

We had lunch at a lovely cafe and being unable to read the menu properly I went for something with Camembert in it. 20min later the waitress bought out a whole, large wheel of camembert, all melty and coated with almond, some sort of brown sugar sauce and bread. It was a good lunch!

Cheese at the Chimay shop, we tasted four of these and they have got to be among the nicest cheeses I have ever tasted!

We also ordered the full tasting experience for 10 euros each...I must admit that after the four delicious beers I needed a long walk, but it was very worth it!

Well we have one more day in Belgium, and then were due to catch the ferry to England. Bye.

On The Road

Hi everyone. We picked up our van last week Wednesday after a one night delay due to a mix up about payment, a lost in translation moment. So we've now been on the road for a bit over a week and in that time have made our way down to Chimay, Belgium. On the way we really noticed, and appreciated, the change in the landscape. The Netherlands is a beautiful place, but it really is... flat. I had no idea that I would so quickly miss the drama of home - the hills, cliffs, and ocean - but there you go.

Just a few interesting things we've discovered so far:

• Dinant is a very pretty town. (Pictured above)
• Road maintenance and upkeep is not a priority in Belgium – even less than at home.
• You can buy Chimay Blue in a six pack or carton from the supermarket.  (individual price EU 1.59!)
• The Catholic church was beyond extravagant with money.   It makes me sad to see these monumental cathedrals and the way God was used by men for their gain.

We went to Chimay yesterday, the town with the abbey, the beer and the cheese. Let me just say that those monks know their stuff.   You can't tour their brewery but they've set up their own bar/restaurant/hotel just down the road and it is excellent!  We did a beer and cheese tasting and it was delicious.   Worth coming to Belgium just for that.

We're now heading up to Brussels for a bit more of the city atmosphere.  Following that we'll be taking the train to England on the 7^th.  It will be good to see Sarah and organise Berlin/Munich for the end of our trip.

That's all for now.

PS. If you have any suggestions for things you recommend we should see, feel free to let us know.