Jeff: The final post

The next morning we headed back to the park up to service the van before we headed off for a nearby town called Bad Wildbad. We parked up and got some food in before we headed to the local spa which is a Moorish spa. Many of the Moorish pools were closed for renovation but we knew that before going. All of the saunas were open as were many of the larger pools. We headed in for a couple of hours, which turned out to be about 4 hours and we went into 5 aufguss ceremonies which is basically when someone comes into the sauna and adds ice to the heater and waves it around the room till you boil. Its fun but man its hot!

After all that relaxing we headed a little north to a town called Karlruhe where we parked up for the night on the edge of a large green park area. The town is really weirdly designed and seems to flow in circles from the palace in the centre and has a lot of green space, which was what we wanted.

The next morning we both did longer runs now we are both uninjured and once back and showered we headed on the bikes into the centre. It was only a couple of km but its quicker than walking. We headed for a vegan café for a breakfast treat before we walked around the town and to the huge palace. We didn’t head in as we have a busy day so finally we headed back to the bikes and back to the van to continue the journey. We finally arrived at Merzig, following a little stop to do some shopping, where we are parking up at a wolf centre. This centre started up as a way to understand wolves and they have expanded the park to give the wolves more space to be as natural as possible. It’s a free park and owned by the whole village so we walked in and had a quick look around, even though it was closing 15 minutes later. Once back at the van we chilled for the evening and listened to the wolves howling at the moon before we headed to bed.

The next morning we headed back into the park and the wolves were more active, partially because from the look of the carcasses on the ground they had been fed but also because it was cooler than yesterday. We walked around the park for a short time before we headed to the van and on to Luxembourg where we headed straight for the city centre and parked at the park and ride. Luxembourg’s public transport is all completely free which was crazy to us but we thought we should test it out. We jumped on the bus and headed into the city before jumping on another bus to head to a different part of the city to have some food before exploring. It was on this bus that a man kicked off and was shouting as he had missed his stop and wanted to get off the bus but the diver wouldn’t let him until the next stop. It was quite an experience and while some people came to the drivers defence we were all glad when we finally got off and walked away.

We managed to get some lovely vegan brunch before we headed back on the bus to the main centre and we walked around the centre which is spread along a green luscious valley with several bridges crossing it and the valley is enclosed by the old city walls, some of which contain miles of tunnels. We walked along the valley taking, went up in the panoramic elevator, took the funicular to the top of a hill and headed in the cathedral. It was a very small but interesting city and before long we had seen all the major sights so we grabbed some dinner and headed back on the bus to the park and ride where we chatted to some brits (now we are getting closer to the UK we are seeing more and more Brits) and we headed to a little town called Assesse in Belgium. This little town was very quiet and we parked up with a great little view of the castle/chateau down the hill and we walked to a very weird and spooky grotto which was built in the 1900s for St Anthony and is a cave like structure with creepy statues in and lots of nooks and crannies. You can walk all the way through it and up stairs at the back. In each area there are different statues, including a man on his death bed, a winged devil type statue a group of men looking at/for something. It was very odd indeed!

The next day we headed to Ghent for the day as we haven’t been since 2017. We parked about 10k outside the city and cycled in. it’s a nice city and slightly less busy than Bruges but still have some beautiful architecture. We wandered the town with not too much direction but managed to see most of the sights including the cathedral and the town hall as well as more modern ones like graffiti street, where there was someone working on a piece of work. We grabbed a nice vegan pizza before we headed back to the van and we drove not far to a stop near Gavere where again there were more Brits to chat to for the evening. We also got to watch an interesting sport taking place, vertical archery. It involved people shooting straight up into the air to hit targets off a large green pole and when they hit the targets they fell to the ground. It seemed like a dangerous sport as you have to be sure where the arrow is going to land and make sure you aren’t below it. Several hit the roof of a little structure which is probably there to keep people safe and under cover and it didn’t half make a racket when it did hit but most just came crashing back to the ground and landed in the grass. We watched it go on for quite awhile as it was interesting and entertaining.

The next morning, our final morning, we headed out for a run next to the river we were parked up near and once done we had a shower and breakfast before we headed off. We were on a mission today to buy some vegan Nutella which has been released in France, Italy and Belgium but wont be released in the UK till next year. After 5 supermarkets we finally found some, and it does taste really good, and we headed to our stop for the afternoon/night as we have to get ready for an early boat tomorrow and hopefully no showdown with the border police.

The next morning, after not enough sleep we headed to the boat and the border police didn’t even want to see our marriage certificate, just waved us through and we got on the boat back to the UK!