Holiday Report

Thanks for all the birthday wishes. It was a great day, even if riding round the M25 in the pouring rain was challenging to say the least!

I think I've just about recovered from our 4 day trip to France, during which we clocked up about 800 miles. The first day was just a swiftish ride to Folkestone to catch the Eurotunnel Train. It was so easy to get on the train it was a bit of an anticlimax. Here are the intrepid travellers, nervous and apprehensive about riding on the wrong side at the other end, enduring their train ride somewhere under the English Channel (or La Manche, depending on your perspective):



We got to St Omer without incident, despite riding down a "chaussée déformé" in our desire to avoid the motorway and found our hotel to be clean, pleasant and convivial.

Day 2 saw us riding into Belgium to Ypres, which is a really pretty town with cobbled streets. I really loved the rooflines.



Then we spent a sombre half an hour viewing the Menin Gate, which bears 54,800 names of commonwealth soldiers killed in WW1 whose remains were never found. I hunted out the Dorsetshire Regiment and was very surprised to find 4 Hoopers on the roll. Hooper was my Great Grandparents' name. Gramphy fought in the Great War in the Regiment and I can't help wondering if any of the others were relatives of mine. One day when I get round to doing some serious ancestral research I may find out.



From Ypres it was on to Tyne Cot cemetery near Paschendale, and another nearly 12,000 graves. All very sad and you can really see how almost an entire generation were wiped out, and for what, one wonders now?



All in all it was a very thought-provoking day, lightened somewhat by copious quantities of Belgian chocolate.

Day 3 we returned to Calais and rode along the coast, through Sangatte, infamous as the jumping on point for would-be illegal immigrants to join the train to England, and past Cap Blanc Nez and Cap Griz Nez. It was so windy we were practically riding at 45º. We turned inland through some really pretty countryside and ended up in another cobbled town, Montreuil-sur-Mer, for lunch. I haven't got any postcard photos to show you of the windmills, waterwheels, gorgeous countryside and well-fed cows due to the lack of helmetcam, so you'll just have to imagine.

Day 4 we got up at the crack of dawn and returned to England, arriving before we had left due to the time difference. We stopped for a bikers breakfast at Wessons in Horam, had lunch at the Cricketers Arms in Wisborough Green:



and finished off with tea and cakes in Stockbridge before riding home.

On Friday we recovered and washed the bikes:



which sorely needed a bath.

All in all it was a lovely time away and now I've done it I look forward to riding on the Continent again. The roads are nice, the French and Belgian people we encountered couldn't have been more friendly and the food, well, let's just say I may have put on a few pounds!

I did take my knitting and I'll update later this week, but before I go, I thought you might like to see my birthday present from my lovely husband: