contentedsouls

Popped into the ‘Sport Bar’ (the only bar) in Lumes to see if they would be screening the France v Germany match as a) we thought it would be fun to watch it with the locals b) it would be good for our French c) we had a French boat moored in front of us and a German boat behind and didn’t fancy being referees! Despite the name of the bar they didn’t have a TV; in fact they didn’t have TV at home either. Very difficult to go in there without getting the giggles as Monsieur is the spit of Renee in ‘ello ‘ello. We tried to explain this to them but got into very deep water as they hadn’t a clue about the programme – well without a TV they wouldn’t, would they- but we didn’t know that and I thought it had aired in France. The other thing that gives me the giggles there is their toilet. Would you believe it’s still the old hole in the shower tray with the raised footprints. Twenty odd years since I’ve encountered one of those and my knees don’t handle the experience as well as they used to – at least I remembered to get off the footprints before flushing and, thus, didn’t have to suffer the indignity of returning to the bar with soaking wet feet!

Peeing with rain this morning and we set off in the car for Sedan as we had heard that they had a good market on Saturday mornings – apparently everyone else agreed, as we couldn’t get a parking space within miles and we gave it up after doing a little out of town shopping and drove down to Pont a Bar on the Ardennes Canal to try and get better waterways maps. Guess what; they were closed for lunch and, although we hung around, didn’t re-open at the appointed hour.

No pics today due to the weather so a chance to catch up with loads that got missed, due to no internet, between Namur and Fumay. We were moored at Vieux Wallerand waiting for Sarah and Andy to come out for a cruise and took a trip out in the car to Hierges.

A gorgeous old village up a winding road with a dead end and an old fort.

The four of us climbed up to the ruins and the chateau

A pair of wild boar stood guard over the gates to the chateau (privately owned). These were the first we’d seen, but they have become a recurring theme subsequently.

Looking back down to the village

Quite a scarabble on loose shale in places, I envied the dogs their 4 legs

Then we crossed back into Belgium for a much needed paddle and some dog walking along the R. Viroin; 35km of dedicated kayak water ooooh. Lovely. Should have got G to help me in upstream and then collected me at the ‘end’ here. I’d love to do a long downstream (of course) run instead of always out and back – the kayak equivalent of a circular dog walk I guess, so much nicer. Oh well, one day.

G set the sat nav to take us home and we ended up travelling through Belgian forests along cart tracks. I was all for turning round but G stuck with it and, eventually, hit a bit of smoother track that came out by an old border post as we crossed back into France.

A fun day out and we need to make more use of the car. We bought an old fashioned Road Atlas today to make more sense of where we are and what’s worth visiting.