No breakie today, just a quick decaf coffee and hot water with a slice of lemon for me. We were out of there by 8am, planning to have breakie down the road to Antwerp, which is another storey. Will come back to that shortly.
Today's route was a lot better than yesterday's; starting in Breda as mums were dropping kids off to school and a few early starters making their way to work as we made our way out of Breda. Soon we were on cycle paths taking us through fields, farms and and along canals where these 2 dudes were fishing, living the dream. There's something to be said about retirement. You know, I miss fishing more than playing golf.
Moving along, through beautiful landscapes, listening to the twittering of the birds and the sound of the wheels (don't let it drive you crazy); this is what bike touring is all about on a beautiful day. What a difference a day makes? Today's route was in complete contrast to yesterday's.
A couple of hours later into our ride and no supermarket, cafe or a bakery in sight, feeling peckish, we sat down on a bench in a Christian memorial on a street corner to search through our rations bought the previous day and shared an apple and carrot cake which went down like manna from heaven. Feeling energised, off we went, still hoping to find a small village with a supermarket en route to Antwerp. It wasn't until now that we discovered we had crossed the border into Belgium (there was no signs) from the number of cars with Belgian number plates.
There were quite a few
farms along the way, mostly cattle, some pigs and some sheep and quite a few
horses, some with fowls. Also came across a farmyard with tiny calves in
pens which I though was a bit cruel (should be with their mums at that age)
Moving along, came across a young man on his bike going in the opposite direction to us to ask for directions to a supermarket and bingo there was one about a a 1km away and luck would have it, it was on our route. Stocked up with bread rolls and biscuits, in search of a bench to sit on and yes we found one also at another Christian memorial. Guess, people must be religious here.
By now, with the wind getting stronger, we were riding along a canal with 20km to Antwerp, we encountered everything, cargo ships, ferries and house boats on the canal and a gaggle of geese and my favourite pooch, a bulldog (of course, I had to stop to take a photo).
The final few kms into Antwerp, still along the canal, it was quite industrial until our route took us into Antwerp proper through the old town to our private room in a hostel, full of character, which is a really cool place with really nice owner and staff. After freshening up, went for a stroll through the town to the central station which is quite something special, This photo doesn't do it justice but what the heck, here it is. To see what it really is like, check out this link (strongly recommended) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_hlvRNgGOQ
So, to date have covered 1,392km in our saddle since the start of our tour on 1 June; 1 puncture, 2 and half hours of rain and a little bit of head wind, we are doing alright and seen wonderful places and more importantly met really nice people. We will now take a break to visit family in the UK for a couple of weeks before reconvening when we will resume our blog.
Finally, thank you for following our tour and your encouragement and a special thanks to my mate, Ellwood for creating the routes.
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