Sunday, 13 June, 2010
We were warned that northern France would be a boring succession of wheat fields and I suppose in a way that is the case but on a bicycle you are so much a part of the landscape and things are different all the time on a smaller scale that we never found it boring. Sure, when the elements are against you it does get tedious at time and you wonder what the hell you are doing but then you meet some colourful characters in some tiny village and have an interesting time. The ancient toothless old lady in this house was so proud when I gave her a compliment about her lovely garden and waved us off like two long lost friends.
As you get further north the wheat fields are replaced with meadows and the countryside becomes more hilly again, we stopped for some nibbles at one of the many crosses and had this lovely bovine view of the surrounding area
It was quite an easy day further, we hadn’t been too ambitious in our planning and got to our destination quite early, surprised to discover there was a festival going on in the village complete with a market (I have never seen such a collection of junk in my life before except perhaps in my own garage) and fancy fair. As we arrived at camp the proprietor was having a barbecue with his whole extended family and they gave us a standing ovation when I told them we were 50 days on the bike. Nice touch. We discovered that the camp was almost exclusively inhabited by Hollanders and their camper vans, luckily we found a quiet corner near the soccer field, quiet until the game started that was.
Once tent was pitched etc. we explored the junk market and even got to enjoy a bit of French culture, square dancing to the tune of Irish folk songs, quite weird actually and somebody should have told the ladies to smile.
