Leaving France and Going to Belgium

July 19, 2009
First, Freu Geburtstag fur meinem Bruder, Grax! (Happy birthday for my brother, Grax).
We have had an amazing few days. We have not had Internet access, so I have not updated the blog in a while. We had a couple days of tough riding our of Paris. It took us two days to get to Reims, the capital of the Champagne region of France. We got in the spirit by buying a couple bottles of "bubbly". We stayed in a cheap hotel and bought food at a huge grocery store, the biggest I have seen in Europe. It reminded me of Whole Foods. Which reminds me, the previous night I bought our food in an Aldi. Including a bottle of champagne, it cost me about 12 euros. I don't know how they sell things so cheaply.
With the riding being a little difficult, and my cousin Paul's (Linzo) cousin, Lise, expecting us that evening, Jordan and I hopped on a train from Reims to Sedan. It was incredibly easy and pretty cheap. Taking this "short-cut" reminded me of something my cousin, Jim (Rhubes), used to do on our bicycle trip across the United States. If we had a particularly rough day of biking and he did not feel like camping, he would shout "HOTEL". We would find the cheapest place around, and squeeze 5 people into one room. It was great to get out of the heat. Now, when Jordan and I want a break I will shout "TRAIN".
The ride from Sedan to Neufchateau was easy at first, but as soon as we headed North into Belgium it got very hilly. We were in entering the heart of the Ardenne Forest. I was expecting mainly conifers, but it was primarily decidious trees at first. We ended up biking about 65 clicks to get into Neufchateau. From there we biked another 5 tough clicks to Lise and Eric's (nickname is Ballou from the Jungle Book) house. They welcomed us like we were long-lost family. Jordan and I took a walk in the countryside, while Lise and Ballou finished making dinner.
Eric has an interesting background. He was a psychologist for some time, but now he has a solar panel business. His panels heat water, rather than make electricity. He has installed several of them in the old farmhouse we are staying in and is in the process of running plastic tubing underneath all the floors. Hot water running through the tubes will heat the place. The house was built in the 1890's. He figures he will be totally done in about four years. I would love to see it when he is done.
Lise came to Brussels from Quebec several years ago to visit a friend and met Eric. They fell in love, and after many trans-Atlantic flights, she decided to move to Belgium. I hope we can repay their hospitality by having the two of them come to the USA.
They prepared a traditional Belgian meal which was fantastic. We drank several kinds of wine, followed by Remy Martin. We talked until two in the morning. In the morning we had petit dijeunier of bread, cheese, meat, and Lise's home-made jams from her local fruit trees. We then took off for a full day of touring Belgium. Ballou took us to some of his favorite little towns on a beautiful, meandering river. We went into a 1,000 year old castle in one town. He had been there many times and probably knew as much as a tour guide. We then ate lunch at another town and made our way to Bastogne.
This was the site of the pivotal stand in the Battle of the Bulge. The memorial to the U.S. allies was impressive. The Belgian people were and still are extremely grateful for the sacrifices America made to liberate them from the Germans in WWII. Over 70,000 people were killed or wounded in Bastogne during the seige. Ballou took us into the woods just outside of Bastogne where the 101st Screaming Eagles had set up one of their defensive perimeters. We found large holes in the ground which were the foxholes that the GI's had dug. They probably constructed roofs from small trees and had their machine guns aimed at the German lines. The show "Band of Brothers" has a couple excellent episodes of this battle. What an incredible day this was! Very emotional to think about what happened here 65 years ago this coming winter.
We drove back to Neufchateau where Lise and Ballou made another culinary masterpiece... pasta carbonara with peppers and zuchini from their own garden... salad, too! We again drank impressive amounts of wine and stayed up talking until 2:30 in the morning. Today we got up, had breakfast, then Ballou and Lise drove us about 15 clicks to Libramont, which has a train station. We decided to take the train from their to Brussells. We have been busting our butts on this trip and not spending enough time site-seeing. This will allow us to spend more time in Brussells and Brugges. Also, the biking should be very easy from Brussells to Amsterdam. I will post pictures soon.
A note about beer: Eric is very proud of Belgian beer. One of his favorites is Orval, which he served us on Friday night. It was unbelievable! I am going to find more in Brussells, but I think it may be fairly local to the part of Belgium we are in. There are quite a few different kinds of beer here. We will attempt to taste many of them!
Jordan and I hopped on a train to Brussels and arrived around 3PM. We are staying in a cheap hotel pretty close to the center of town. We will stay here for two nights a and then ride to Gent. This is a cool town. We will do all the touristy stuff tomorrow.