Back on the road again – France, Belgium and Luxembourg

Well, it’s has been more time than we expected since our last post and getting on the road again in our new truck. A staggering 14 weeks to get our truck UK registered somewhat derailed our plans. Our Rugby World Cup tickets were sold, but thankfully we were able to spend much more time getting everything how we wanted. We still hope to do the Pan American highway in 2025, so the next few weeks, now we are on the road, is mainly focused on preparation rather than exploration.

We started our trip with a short stop at City West in Exeter as we had noticed a front axle service was due soon on our truck, having now reached nearly 3000 miles with delivery mileage and tests etc. We set off early and went the long way round so we could enjoy one of our favourite spots for a coffee on route overlooking St. Michael’s Mount, we were in no rush.

The trip to Exeter, also gave us the chance to visit Greendales farm shop which we discovered on a previous visit to get some lunch and supplies while we waited. Thankfully it was quick job and were on our way to an iconic park-up overlooking Stonehenge for our first night.

It was surprisingly busy for a midweek night in October, but we managed a walk and some photos before a fabulous home cooked meal of fresh scallops, new potatoes and samphire from the farm shop for a fabulous first night to our trip.

My meticulous plans to catch sunrise behind Stonehenge from our truck with my new camera were sadly thwarted by early morning mist. We saw the stones emerge from the clouds at dawn from closer to whilst we were dog walking, passing greetings with the poor security guards who keep an overnight vigil there. I felt saddened after all these hundreds of years it should be needed now, but then I thought of the heart break cause by the felling at the Sycamore Gap and felt relieved it is protected.

We did get to play offroad mode on the track exiting Stonehenge which is deeply rutted with potholes. Surprisingly it did not deter normal motorhomes and cars, despite the occasional sounds of groundings we heard through the evening before. Though from the reviews we read beforehand, many do not return.

A thankfully uneventful M25 traverse and Eurotunnel crossing had us gratefully emerging to the blue skies and sunshine of France. We began to think the UK had been receiving more than its fair share of wet and grey weather, until we entered the grey skies in Belgium. A new country for us on our motorhome travels.

Our first stop was at Ypres for a long held plan to visit the Menin Gate, where a twice daily Last Post is sounded to remember the terrible carnage there in WWI. Inevitably after a long wait to get here, the whole thing was covered in scaffold, albeit with its image drawn on the screen cover. The War Graves office confirmed all would still go ahead. We took the time to wander around the very pretty town of Ypres whilst we waited. A very large number of English voices and UK school coach parties suggested we were not the only ones there to commemorate.

We took the time to visit a friterie (chip shop) and chocolate shop as recommended by locals, Belgium’s famous specialities. We underestimated the crowd that would gather though in the temporary bridge location (during renovation works) for the 8pm Last Post and ended up behind teenagers who were far more interested in our dogs than the proceedings. I discovered recently I had a great grandfather who served in WWI from the age of 17 and did not seem to recover, dying at only 39 in an asylum, shell shock / PTSD not being recognised then as now. This Last Post ceremony was something I had looked forward to attending. The Last Post still gave me goosebumps, even if I could not see the buglers due to my height disadvantage, I was able to watch back Kevin’s video afterward at least.

Strangely though, my abiding memory of the event was being shocked at the youth of the Notts brigade who marched out for the ceremony, as is a sure sign of growing older yourself. Then, I realised so many of those who died were their age and younger, seeming even younger in uniform like a first year students at school.

The next day, we moved on to Bruges, such an iconically pretty city, we could not pass by. Kevin had not been, though I had previously when interailing at 18. It was just as quaint as I remembered though much busier, even in October, although it was still as well preserved.

Starlink proved its worth as we were able to watch England take a narrow victory in the World Cup Bronze final uninterrupted with a Belgian beer for refreshment back in the truck.

Saturday after by-passing Brussels, having had enough city life for now, we arrived at another iconic battle site at Waterloo. The site is now dominated by the Butte du Lion (Lion’s mound), completed in 1826 and commissioned by King William I of the Netherlands during his dwindling popularity. It was to remind his people of his heroic deeds at the battle, where he took a musket ball in the shoulder and fell from his horse. The site was still part of the Netherlands then, later becoming part of Belgium. The conical mound with lion statue on top offers views across the battlefields, after mounting its 225 steps.

Before embarking on the mound, we visited the excellent museum more modestly presented below ground level and visible only as staircases from above ground. It was very modern and interactive with a really impressive 4D cinematic recreation of the battle on a wrap around screen and obligatory silly glasses. The story of the multiple allies under Wellington command looking to maintain the royalist status quo against Napoleon is really well told. It was good to come here and see the culmination of the story, told as a timeline of both armies in their gathering forces and converging, one army and their story on each side of a corridor to the 4D cinema, besides models of mounted and walking uniformed troops of both sides. Having travelled along the Route Napoleon last year ourselves, which Napoleon traversed on his escape from Elba before meeting the Allies in battle at Waterloo, we could really picture the places and distances involved.

Housed in an adjacent circular building, is the 1912 equivalent of the cinema, a 110 metre long, 12m high 360 degree painting of the battle created by a French navy artist. Amazing detail, I cannot imagine how you could even plan something on such a scale.

Sunday we took a little slower with a couple of hours drive to a lovely woodland park-up on the edge of the Ardennes Forest, passing multiple familiar places on the way – Rochefort, Ciney and others like reading a Belgian beer menu.

We only had a 30 minute drive the next morning to reach Bastogne, the site of the Battle of the Bulge, the last ditch counteroffensive by Hitler in the retreat following D-Day. So, within one week and 300km, we have visited WWI, WWII and Napoleonic battlefields. I had no idea it was all so close together, we had not set out with this as a plan, merely found these on our route. Clearly this area is a strategic and highly contested location / route.

The Band of Brothers film (one of Kevin’s favourites) follows 101st Airborne division who were drafted in to support when Germany made their attack. The gruelling conditions in hastily dug foxholes in the middle of winter in the woods surrounding Bastogne with bullets and shells flying through the trees is particularly harrowing footage of the reality of war (well as close as Hollywood can get).

The small town of Bastogne holds 3 sites, the main Museum, but also the original Barracks and Mess building which are also now museums (though closed when we visited). The Bastogne War museum was opened in 2014 and has a really engaging multimedia displays, including audio tours with specific real-life characters who were caught up in events telling their story of the war as the history is relayed. Apparently, the young local boy is now a great grandfather living in the town. The footage is shown in sets – the Bastogne woods, a cafe which lifts up during the show to reveal the basement where all 4 of the characters end up meeting during the worst of the battle, it was really well told and well worth a visit.

However, the main event for Kevin especially was getting to visit the actual foxholes dug by members of Easy Company (portrayed in Band of Brothers) in woodland 4km from the museum and accessible with your museum ticket. The darkness of the dense woodland must have been terrifying with bullets flying from out of sight, you really did get more of the feel of that going there in person.

We managed a lovely little lay-by park-up on our own next to the nearby Peace Woods for the night, where each tree holds a plaque to a fallen soldier and all of the many brigades are remembered. Over 81,000 US, 1,400 UK, 67,000 Germans and 3,000 civilians were lost, one of the bloodiest battles of the war and the worst loss of lives the US experienced in WWII.

Finally, the end of our first week, we entered another new country for us, of Luxembourg, not just for the cheaper fuel (about 20-25c / litre less than Belgium), but also to visit Luxembourg City. We parked up at the Park and Ride, free for 24 hours and took the free bus into the city centre. We had a rather average lunch and then decided to follow the Wenzel Circular walk around the upper (Haut) and lower (Grund) parts of the city which is built around a gorge.

The walk starts at the ruins of former Count’s castle from 963 AD (the birthplace of the city) and follows fortifications from the Middle Ages, Spanish period (16th century) and the Wenceslas Wall, once 875m long with 37 towers and 15 gates, of which 4 have been restored. There is also fortifications from Vauban, our old friend, whose citadels and fortresses we have seen across Europe on our travels.

We made the effort to walk the full route and give the city a good chance but the cold and damp of the day did not help and we did not find it a favourite. Still, it was always somewhere I wanted to see since meeting a Luxembourgian on our travels when sailing many years ago. glad we made the effort to stop by.

We now have just under a week to make our way back to Schladming in Austria to visit Krug and get some upgrades done on our truck ready for our travels next year.