Today, for me, is a very sad day. The kids are rejoicing because we're finally going home, but even though I'm excited about seeing Tom and the kids later, and the rest of my family and friends soon after, it's the end of an amazing experience that we probably won't be able to do again, at least not as a whole family.
Yesterday we travelled from Germany to Belgium, stopping off at Wallenborn to see the cold water geyser for lunch, with the kids taking the chance to play in a small park. Then it was on to Ghent, first along small, comfortable country lanes, and then on massive motorways in Belgium that were chaotic and packed full of traffic.
We arrived around teatime, and parked on a side street. The hostel is in the suburbs, about 20 minutes walk from the old town, which we intended to visit but didn't quite manage. I've been threatening to make James sleep in a caravan for a long time, and this was finally my chance - the quirky hostel uses styled up caravans as sleeping pods, and I'd booked a 'jungle' one for the kids and a 'graffiti' one for me and James.
The kids loved their area, and with comfy relaxing seats outside the caravan and a playroom/common room for the kids that had table tennis, table football and a movie cinema, we enjoyed a bit of peace and quiet (and did a bit of work) before heading out to find dinner.
Originally we planned to eat at a kebab shop that James had found, but it turned out to be closed, so we walked a short way along the canal and found a friterie. This part of Belgium is very Flemish, so we had some difficulty deciphering the menu, but we came away with plenty of food and enjoyed it on a random 'beach' structure that was sitting on the bridge. It was great apart from the wasps that seemed to have a particular liking for Felix!
Then we debated about whether to continue into the old town or walk back to the hostel. Given that James was tired after today's demanding driving and the kids were desperate to finish watching Harry Potter in the movie caravan, we decided to head back, and while they watched the film we had a beer in the bar, kriek for me and pils for James - very nice!
Then a quick game of table tennis before heading to bed. The hostel was remarkably quiet at night given that there was no real sound insulation and we slept reasonably well. Breakfast this morning was included, a nice selection of standard items plus a few Belgian specialities including chocolate!
Then the journey to the ferry after finishing work - it was only supposed to be 90 minutes but we took a bit of a detour towards the sea in search of waffles. Unfortunately we failed to find any, but found a lovely patisserie where we each chose something nice. We arrived early for the ferry though not early enough for a different sailing, and that is where I am now.
It's been a wonderful (nearly) 5 months. We have a lot of work to do when we get home as our tenants are moving out and we're swapping houses since the 'big' one needs quite a lot of work. The kids are also thrilled about this. I'm going to be spending some time on navorama, and also busy planning next year's travels - nothing on the scale of this but I'm hoping for something special... Thanks for reading and look forward to seeing many of you soon!
Published on Friday 17 August 2018
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