On a cool, wet Spring day I revisit my travels in Europe last summer to bring back a little of that sunny warmth, and carefree days, and joi de vivre that the continent – and in particle – France seems to have in such abundance.
Follow me as I make my way back to England after Paris-Brest-Paris. On this next leg of the journey I travel to Belgium across rural northern France.
This is a Sunday and so we encounter sleepy villages, quiet canal sides and maybe a little local music and fairground jollity en route.
You can find the route here:
https://www.strava.com/activities/9750530734
Well good morning uh you joined me on my uh Last Day in France for some time for for this trip certainly um stayed with a lovely couple uh last night as part of the vendon op defeats uh organization in cam in northern France just a very rural remote sort of place you wouldn’t
Normally stay in and uh yeah they absolutely wonderful hosts they um off me a glass of wine when I arrived and uh we had a nice chat in the sitting room and then they laid on Lovely meal and in the morning I had uh after one of
Night sleep I had uh um you know usual uh continental breakfast um and yeah it’s a great organization if you haven’t heard of it I would check it out um the only cater for people who arrive under their own steam so if you come byy car you won’t be welcome but come by
Bike or if you’re walking or running or something like that maybe I don’t know canoeing or something you can uh you can use them so today I’m going back into Belgium um and I’ll be staying with a host uh of the same organization in a place called
Goodam uh um don’t have very far to go today only 114 km and only 300 M of climbing as well so not um not a very audious day it’s a Sunday yeah the sun is out once again and uh yeah I’m in rural France this is the
View so kind of s to be saying goodbye to France but uh I’ve been here for best part of I guess 2 weeks now and uh all the good things have to come to an end so I will pick up before I cross the border my last um uh
Pastries see what the if I find a a Ballo blunder pser it’s not always guaranteed um and that will keep me sustained throughout the day and then it’s uh into Belgium so probably taste a Belgium beer this evening hopefully it’s going to stay dry forecast is pretty good might be the OD
Shower bit of a breeze picked up and it’s cooled down it’s definitely in the 20s rather than the 30s uh but that’s really more manageable temperature and uh the wind seems to be blown in the direction I’m heading which is uh is really cool I’ll just uh um
Take along with the miles and the breeze be on my back um and uh I’ll be sure to capture any interest in SS along the way so um stay tuned is Is now this is a town called LOM it’s uh it’s in France but it feels very like it could be Belgium just how’s that sort of feel it’s um something about the brick work maybe it was once in in Bel Belgium and now it’s in France
I don’t know but um I sort of sense that I’m on the border now between uh Belgium and France we’ll soon find and also the street signs are in red like uh jort cuz normally the street signs in France have got like a blue background sorry I mean red right on a yellow
Back Yeah mom um so yeah this is um LOM like Som but with an L very nice just had a beer listen to music I’m now going over this bridge I think and over the very nearly in Belgium now I think it’s another know kilometer or so it’s not very
Far foree spee speech spee spe speech foreign Spech sure [Applause] came over uh as they often do to ask about my bik Mar from colia S I speech speech speech there is we Add Now Okay Happ Oh I have a feeling this really is the last town in France now it’s um I’ve been in France a lot longer than I thought I would be but I’ve just got a good feeling feel that this might be the one that’s the last one before I cross
The border into Belgium we’ll soon find out to verik or verik which has got amazing look this church here maybe it’s a cathedral or an ABY but it very impressive this that’s it I think we’re in Belgium definely that was fun wasn’t it no I’m not in the Netherlands yet I’m
Still in Belgium I’m coming into gullam where my next host awaits [Applause]
1 Comment
Very therapeutic to watch 😊