From France into Belgium

Monday 19 August, the grumpy lady negotiated the time for breakfast, from 7 am to 7.30 am, I like to ride as early as possible because the distance I achieve in an hour in the morning, takes 2 hours in the afternoon, with the heat and the wind. Still hoping for a tail wind sometime! Well I am right on time at 7.25 at the restaurant but it is locked, not a sign of life, all terrace chairs and tables stacked inside. I assume they live upstairs so I rattle the door so loud, the council workers watering the flowers in the square look up.

No response, I pace up and down a bit and have another rattle and a medium sized kick at the door at 7.45. When that has no result I go back to the room and look for a way to force the office door to get my bike out. The lady has such a cough that it crosses my mind she may have died during the night, as I have listened to her coughing fits when she locks up at night. I nearly succeed in opening the door but I fear the wooden strip might break so I ease off. Walking into the passage to go back up to my room to get my bags, a door in the dark end of the passage opens and a sleepy coughing lady appears from the back room! It is now 8.45am. She is very embarrassed and hurries along clutching a plastic shopping bag across the square to the restaurant. She opens up and tries to do every thing at once, tables, chairs, breakfast, coffee, coughing as she goes, now I feel embarrassed having put the pressure on to have breakfast this early. I scoff the breakfast of dry baguette, jam and a single quasson and get up to pay and leave. The lady gets out the receipt book, but when I gesture I do not need a receipt, she writes 120 on the back of the book, giving me a discount of 30 Euro off the negotiated price. She even trusts me with the key to get the bike out of the office, so she would not have to leave the restaurant unattended.  I must have passed the test after all. I finally ride away at 9.30am and the wind is up already. I expect to find the roads much busier from here on, but am surprised at the small back roads the GPS directs me to. The consequence of that is that I see very few shops where I can buy food to keep the fires burning.  I am almost resigned I might have to live on my power bars today when I find a bakery open who sells filled baguettes with blue cheese and tomato. I was pleased after 4 hours and just over 85 km. I ride North through Nogent, Nouran, Breval, cross the river Seine at Vernon, turn left at Thilliers and after 110 km I stop at a large country residence in the middle of nowhere with a sign on the gate saying Maison d' Hotes.

I ask the lady for a bed for one night for one person I my perfect French and she says, "why not!" In English. She says it is 70 euro including breakfast, but I suspect you may want dinner, so please join us for another 20 euro in the big house. The residence sits in 4 hectares of gardens, has some outbuildings in which the B&B guests are housed and a very small thatched cottage, which became home to my bicycle for the night. My room is a complete self contained Unit with a spare bedroom, small kitchen and bathroom. I am given a basket with my breakfast ingredients for me to have in the unit and the lady is quite happy to unlock the gate at 7.30 tomorrow morning. She finds me two 25 cl  bottles of cold Grimsbergen beer on arrival so things cannot be any better in my little world. We have dinner in the kitchen, a little below expectation, but interesting all the same. There are no waiters or a butler, the meal of pasta is cooked by the host. He doesn't speak English but his flamboyant gestures while serving more than make up for it. It isn't a bikers quantity either and the prediction that I will sleep well, after drinking half a bottle of wine between the three of us convinces me that they are not the types to over indulge.

The ride today from Maintenon with Louis XIV's chateau built for his mistress to Doudeauville En Vexin, 112km in 5 h34,  climbing 807m and descending 820 m, still going down.

Tuesday 20 August no sleeping in for this lady, she is waiting at the gate and gives me a pamphlet of her enterprise, she puts her hand on my arm and asks: "where will you eat?"

It makes me wonder if they have ever been outside their estate. The world certainly looks different through each persons window. On the road early after a good breakfast and the legs are willing and spinning before the wind gets up and spoil it all! It is large rolling country again, up and down long slopes over very small roads through Foret de Lyons and fields of wheat, corn and sunflowers. Harvest is in full swing here, a shift of season as further South they were virtually finished. I am close to the sea, a few km inland and traffic becomes notably busier. I ride through Forges les Eaux, Neufchatel, Londinieres. I cross the toll road E 11 several times, but I resist the temptation to prove my point that there are very few Dutch cars on it! The wind is getting very strong and I have given up the idea that today I want to see the sea, as the road doesn't seem to go anywhere near it. When I reach Namont in the early afternoon I call it a day to have time to get my riding garb dry before tomorrow. I spot a pretentious looking hotel, but the room is an interior decorators nightmare. Pink flowery wallpaper in the room that hurts my eyes and dark green tiled walls in the bathroom with a huge bath. I fill it and have a hot soak, which may be a mistake as my legs feel like lead when I climb out of it.

Dinner was unexpectedly beautiful and made up for the tasteless decor. The ride today from Doudeauville en Vexin to Namont was 147 km in 6h48 climbing 1040m and descending 1132m still going down.

Wednesday 21August, I get away from Namont by 8.30 am. I find it hard to get going this morning and blame last nights hot bath. I emailed Hilde (a biker from Belgium I met in NZ) last night who lives in Antwerpen that I will arrive in Belgium today and I hope to get somewhere near Oostende on the coast, by tonight or tomorrow. The roads get flatter but also much busier here with lots of trucks and heavy farm machinery. A long incline of up to 10 % through a forest takes me by surprise and I am pleased to spot some picnic tables not far from the top. I sit down and enjoy my pain o' raisin to recover from the unexpected effort. When I get to the top after a few more bends I ride into the very trendy and historic town of Cassel. The main square is packed with tourists filling up all the terraces in front of the restaurants and cafes. The road is pave, ( basalt cobble stones) not only through the main square, but the continuing road and most of the descent down the other side of this big hill. Which is a punishment instead of reward after a climb, as I have to keep the speed down to walking pace, about 3km/h To prevent the bike from falling to bits ! I finally cross the border into Belgium at Oost Capel and ride on via Beveren and Pollinkhove to Izenberge-Alveringem. The hotel is called Hinterland, very appropriately so. It is not far from Ieper, where so many soldiers died in the trenches of the First World War. There is an extensive tourist industry around here, with guided tours, walk and bike routes, events, museums and  American, Belgian, Commonwealth, French and German War Cemeteries.

It is a sobering experience to see some of the memorials to the young men who gave their lives during this war and the strongest question I felt was why?

The numbers are mind boggling, but has humanity learned anything, I wonder. There are some incredible stories told, two British nurses "The Angels of Pervijze" worked from a basement 50 m from the trenches, her dog took a request to the German commander, he agreed for them to collect the wounded in no mans land between battles, they would not shoot, provided they wore there nurses caps and not helmets. The Menin Gate, the large commonwealth memorial, stands on the site of one of the old town gates, through which thousands of soldiers passed, on the way to the front. It was opened in 1927, it bears the names of 54.896 soldiers who were reported missing in Ipres between the outbreak of the war and  17 August 1917. Because the gate is to small to hold the names of all the missing, the names of a further 34.000 are commemorated on the panels of the Tyne Cot Memorial in Passendale. The Last Post is played every evening at 8 pm at the Menin Gate, by buglers from the local fire brigade, The traffic stops during this ceremony, it has been held since 1928, the only interruption was during the German occupation of 1940 to 1944, when it was performed at Brookwood Barracks in England. More than 60 million soldiers were mobilised during the war, of which 10 million died. There is a 37.5 km thematic cycle route called: "No More War", maybe it should be compulsory for all world leaders and politicians of this world, to ride this route before taking up office. Are we civilised enough, I wonder.

Today's ride from Namont to Izeberge-Alveringem was 126 km in 5h45, climbing 809 m and descending 820 m, yes still going down.