farms2fields: On to Flanders

The ride across the English Channel is not exactly difficult, in fact we didn't even show i.d. or a passport in order to get on the ferry. After arriving in Calais we simply drove off the ship onto the highway and off we went, again no proof of who we were or where we were from, getting around in the EU is not that painstaking of a process. Our first stop of the day in France/Belgium was to find a little French village and walk around, get a bite to eat and see what we could find. We drove to Montreuil which is one of many of the same name, this one happened to be a walled town, that felt like stepping back into time or into a storybook, actually most places I’ve been in Europe feel that way. We strolled around, ducked in and out of shops, mostly out cuz everything seems to be closed, maybe since it was Wednesday, dunno really. I saw a small opening in between buildings that I darted into, this led to the outer wall of the city, where we walked along the wall, talked or tried to talk to some French tourists, took some pics and then we found a small café for a meal. We had already determined that we’d like to go to Belgium next, of course it’s not like it was right in the next town, in fact to get our destination we would be driving another couple of hours, but hey why not how often are you trolling around a new continent, so off we went.

The drive through Flanders was very pretty, and we when we crossed into Belgium there was just a small sign no passport stamp or check or anything, it feels like the States really, just going from one country to another. We did the TomTom working properly which proved to be a God send as we approached Brugge or Bruges depending how you want to write it. Brugge as I’ll call it is the “Venice of the North” as the old town was built using many canals. I didn’t realize how famous Brugge was until I read up a bit and found out it was one of very few Belgian/Northern French cities that wasn’t destroyed or partially destroyed by WW’s. The city centre of Brugge is like walking back in time, cobblestone streets, small gabled buildings, some baroque looking buildings, massively tall towers, and of course the canals running here and there. People were running here and there as well since it was Christmas season, unfortunately the Christmas markets were not up and running yet, they were being set up, including the outdoor skating rinks in the square. Brugge has amazing squares as do most European cities, except for here it seemed like we walked through 3 of them in about 10 minutes. Brugge is famous for many things including lace, beer and Belgian chocolate, and there are loads of chocolate shops, but no free samples that I saw.

To say that we did Brugge in about 2 hours is a joke, but we did get a feel for the city, albeit a small feel. Of course it gets dark very early around these parts and in the back of my mind was the ferry, it was going to sail and we needed to be on it. I thought that if we left Brugge at 5:15 it would give us just enough time to get to Calais find the ferry, make one stop if we needed to and then we’d be off. We left at 5:20 found the ferry, showed our ticket and literally drove onto the vessel. To say the least I was bushed, I had driven all over the south of England on Tuesday, and then around Northern France and Belgium on Wednesday, all this for a guy who doesn’t really like to drive. Rebecca took the wheel after we were back in Dover and she drove the couple hours to Overton where we fell into bed.

Calais, France from the ferry