Wollonia to Waterloo

I read an article in an English camping magazine about the beauty of Wollonia,a region in the south east of Belgium. It's close to Luxembourg so we headed there for a look.

    The houses changed to stone facade,large, and quite pretty, and the first major town, Dinant , was lovely.

  It sits on the river Meuse which is a very busy waterway to Paris and the south.

  To enter Dinant from the south you have to pass through this gap in the rock which is only 400 mm wider than a campervan with the mirrors in. It was fun to watch the vans stop ,and the wives jump out and guide hubby through.

 Reminded me of when we tried to take a Chevy van through a gap in a redwood tree and got stuck !

It has a big Jazz festival here and The saxophones are a permanent display. 

 We intended to bike along the river but couldn't find a camp near it. They were all full of permanent trailer home people, scruffy, with lots of dogs and beer bellied Belgiums.

  The river was very industrialized and the roads busy so we left it and went looking for a camp further west. 

  When we came across one in the grounds of a chateau we thought we were right. Yeah right !

  It had 750 sites and was set up like a theme park. Kids and dogs by the thousand. Also twice what we'd been paying in France. Never mind, I've seen Wollonia and it's not an area I'd rush back to.

The next morning after a good sleep in, we set the sat nav for Waterloo. Don't use it often but drivings not so easy here. 

  Waterloo ,kids, is where Wellington defeated Napolean. Google it!

 Its a huge tourist attraction and that big hill is a man made monument. When you climb to the top the battlefield is explained ,out there in front of you.

  Now ,I come from a mural town and some of ours are big, but this one , painted in 1926 of the battle, is 110 meters long by 12 high. They built a special round pavilion to house it and you can stand on a platform in the middle to view it.

  Just fantastic !

  We've dropped back into France tonight, I DO like France, and are in a town called la Quesnoy . It has a special NZ connection which I'll tell you about next time.

Metz and the Moselle

Most villages we'd passed through in the Lorraine were not what you'd call pretty.

 The main streets are usually wide but without the flowers and colour of other parts of France.

  The city of Metz is quite nice though, and the Saturday that we arrived was market day. This is part of the huge covered market beside the Cathedral

      Cheeses! Let me at 'em

They always label kiwi fruit as 'grown in NZ' even chilian fruit.

Everyone stocks up on a Saturday, as all shops including supermarkets close Sunday. The  boulangeries are open until mid day, after that it's tough luck !

  The Moselle , which runs through Metz, has a great cycle way . You can even do it the easy way and have this little boat follow you with your bed.

If our map shows a village with a sign like this we go out of our way to visit it. This one is called Rodemack.

  Nearby , we found a camp on the edge of the Moselle again. Same price as the other too. €11 

  That chateaux is in Germany and the far bank is Luxembourg 

Today we visited a vintage car and tractor show in Luxembourg . It's a lovely little country, clean and colorful,and with the cheapest gas ! € 1.22/  

I think the driving age might be a bit low though

Tonight we're back in Belgium and tomorrow will head for a region called Wollonia .

Verdun

This camp was so relaxing we stayed an extra night. Truth is, the old back needs a bit of a rest.

  There must be a smelting plant upstream as I saw several loads of scrap metal going past ,and a couple of barge loads of reinforcing steel going the other way.

Toul is another walled town , right on the Moselle . Not as interesting to these old dears though ,as the clothes in the market. ( pricey I thought )

We're making our way north to Verdun and through some of the most fought over land in France. By stopping at the military cemetery's we passed, we could read a brief history of the front in that area. 

The Americans came into the war when things were at a bit of a stalemate, and made a crucial impact by taking the Saint Mihiel Salient. 350,000 of them and 117,000 French.The Armistice was signed 2 months later so it must have made the difference.

  This memorial is on Montsec and the cemetery is near by. Beautifully managed by the American war graves commission .

Verdun is a beautiful town with a lovely port and an amazing underground citadel  . We went through a museum on a little train inside its maze of passages. Nice and cool too as its 37 degrees outside.

The battle for Verdun lasted 300 days at a cost of 700,000 casualties from both sides. It's a wonderful place to visit, as you can drive along the front line from fort to fort amongst the trenchs and the barbed wire. 

  It's just been left for all to see, even the remains of a village that was destroyed by the bombing .

The Ossuaire memorial looks down on a graveyard of 15,000 Frenchmen ,but was built to house the bones of 130,000 from both sides. A movie theatre underneath tells the story of the war very well.

 We particularly liked the rose bush on each grave.

See,  rose and rose of them

   Found a lovely campsite not far along the road to Metz. It's on a farm ,with a fishing lake . Only 10 euros and you can try to catch a carp for only 2 euros .

  

Marne-au-Rhin canal

After looking around the old town and a collection of old bikes, we headed for the gap in the Vosges mountains where the Marne-au-Rhine canal comes through on it's way to the Rhine at Strasbourg.

It's 40 degree's today so we checked into a motor camp in Severne. 

   There's a lovely harbour here and we were chatting to an Aussie from this barge who had been here since last October. He's waiting to go to Paris but the sliding lock on this route had a major catastrophe and so he waits !

 Saturday morning and an early start to beat the heat. We're going to bike the 15 Km's west to the 'Plan Incline',as the sliding lock is called.

  As the canal climbs up into the hills of this region, the Lorraine, it goes up a lot of big locks. This one is in the main street of Severne

The canal follows the Marne valley and there's still plenty of shade. After 10 Km's we pass through Lutzelbourg.

This little village was swamped by a wave of water when the Plan Incline malfunctioned.

  Before it was built, canal traffic came down a huge staircase of locks . They are now ghostly remains and part of the cycle way even goes up the middle of it .

Without it working , the best I can show is this model of the lift.45 meters of lift!

  The catch on the top right malfunctioned while a tourist boat was half way in. They couldn't close the lock gate so 30 kilometers of canal water, surged down through the valley.

Enough drama, but the Aussie may have a long wait.

   Yesterday we followed the canal westward and ended up camped next to a cemetery near mouacourt. Quiet neighborhood but I bet I could never find it again. I do remember this stork on someone's chimney though.

This morning we explored the lovely city of Nancy. At the port we met these lovely kiwis, Ruth and Roger from the Bay of islands who winter over in France in their barge. They were able to replenish our book supply thank goodness! 

What a boat,  I was green with envy , but Roger was complaining about the harbour master charging 22 euros a night to berth here.

Tonight we are just outside Nancy in a camp on the Moselle, at Villey-le-sec