Travel Tribulations
Travel in a strange land, with limited luggage, under your own steam, throws up it’s problems sometimes. For the next three days I will give excerpts from Barbara’s diary:-
Wednesday 27 September – Arras to Belval Abbey.
“We had breakfast and then made cheese and tomato and jam sandwiches with our left-overs and a baguette bought from a bakery this morning. We managed to get away not long after 10 and walked our bikes across the Grand Place. At first we had to follow a main road but eventually got out into really quiet countryside. The weather was good for cycling, I took off my rain jacket. We picnicked for lunch seated on a bench outside a church that was a historic monument 177? – the last figure was missing. Like so many buildings in the Nord it was marked by wars, bullet holes and damaged structures.
“I told Nick thet I wouldn’t have the energy to cycle somewhere for supper this evening (the Abbey being isolated) . We arrived at a commercial estate where there was a Lidl store, so Nick went and got bread, cheese, tomatoes, chocolate etc. to have at the Abbey for supper. We cycled on and found signs to the Abbey but had difficulty locating the entrance, eventually we got there and discovered where to pick up the keys to our room. the accommodation is rather spartan, a small room with two single beds and a tiny wet-room bathroom. After we had put our stuff in the room we went to see if the shop had anything consumable – they had their own beer, so we got a bottle of that. We had a snooze, Nick woke me up at 7 for supper. There was a garden-style table and two chairs outside in the corridor, Nick brought in the table and a chair (he sat on the bed). Because we had forgotten to bring penknives we had to improvise, Nick got the beer open with a pair of pliers from the cycle toolkit and I cut the soft cheese with a credit card.
Thursday 28 September 2023 Abbey belval to Avroult.
(From Barbara’s diary) “”At Breakfast we were able to taste the abbey’s apple juice, honey and cheese amongst things on offer. We set off at about 10, not an exciting way. The weather was cloudy but warm”. … “We went first to Penens, where we found a small market in progress, we were able to ask the stallholder of the cheese stall to cut the Mimolette cheese that we bought into slices, he even cut the rind off.
“We carried on coming to some off-road tracks that I found very difficult, especially the muddy ones. Nick sometimes found smoother roads, but that could mean sharing the road with heavy tankers, farm vehicles and lorries.
[after a tiring ride] … “We reached within 2km of the place Nick thought we were going to stay only for him to discover that it was a further 8.5km away in a village called Avrout – I was very disheartened by this as we were in an area called “Les Sept Vallees” and we had already climbed two long steep hills. With a struggle and a pain in my left leg we reached the chambre de hote. The owners were out but had left us a key and instructions, It was a cosy place and we were delighted to find a kettle with tea and coffee and goodies. We rested […] We went out at about 19:00 to find a friterie that was supposed to be in the village [it was a small place strung along a main road, not a great place] but it was not there, we did pass a local produce shop so hurried back there and before it closed. We bought 2 savoury pastries, a bottle of stout some locally made yogurt and two big apples. Back at the Chambre de hote we were about to eat our supper in the garden when the hosts came out and invited us to eat inside in the warm, so we accepted. They provided plates and cutlery and warmed-up our pastries, gave us a couple of tomatoes from their garden and made coffee afterwards. They revealed that they had 6 children and 10 grandchildren”.
Friday 28th september Avrout to Boulogne.
Suffice to say this was another quite hard day’s riding, many French cities have cycle routes leading into them, but Boulogne, still a busy port despite the channel tunnel, has no cycle routes from the south side, the traffic was heavy and unpleasant and we ended up pushing our bikes for the last mile or so, just because the roads were so awful to cycle. It is all about the JOURNEY and not the DESTINATION – but still it’s nice to arrive sometimes.
Boulogne at last
We had a small flat in Boulogne, but it was rather disappointing after the great pleaces we had stayed in up to then. Rather shabby. It was in a good position though, next to the old town walls.
The part of town within the old Roman/Medieval city walls is very nice – the port less so.
And a major attraction in Boulogne is the aquarium.
