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Paying respects - A trip to Belgium and France
9th Oct - 12th Oct 08So, the plan initially was to go back to Scotland, a trip we did last year, but to spend an extra day to get up to John O Groats and Ullapool, rather than just Skye and Inverness.
Unfortunately it seems that the weather forecast disagreed with this plan, and so with the time off already booked, an alternative plan was hatched to head towards slightly better weather in Northern Europe.
I've always wanted to visit the Normandy beaches, whereas my mate wanted to go to Bruge and some WW1 sites. We decided to do both, over 4 days, which would be about 1400 miles in total
10 October 08,
Living up north has its advantages - we have amazing roads on our doorstep, including the North Yorkshire Dales and the Lake District. Its not… » more
Living up north has its advantages - we have amazing roads on our doorstep, including the North Yorkshire Dales and the Lake District. Its not so great for getting to Folkstone though, so today was going to be a motorway slog.
With the intention being to get on the road by 9:30am, it wasn't a good start when Dave's GS showed a warning light which seemed to suggest a bulb was out somewhere. With the engine off, it looked like it was the main headlight, so we had a panicked run across town to try and get a replacement from Halfords. That didn't solve the problem though, so we went to a local dealer. He asked Dave to start the bike and the light came straight on - in our rush we'd forgotten that they are 'running lights' and need the engine to be on Embarassed . Dave, in true BMW owner fashion, maintained that it must still be a problem because his computer told him so, but we decided to just hit the road before we missed the train. In fact the warning light is still on now and we have no idea why, but it caused us about an hours delay.
There's no pleasant way to deal with the M1, but it doesn't help when your ipod plugs fall out in the first few miles, and with no time to stop, it would be about 180 miles before I could put some earplugs back in. A quick splash and dash near the M25 and we were off towards the tunnel, with the sound of silence in my ears. I started feeling quite comfortable about the time when we approached the Dartford bridge - I'd got it into my head that it was only 30 miles to the Channel Tunnel and we had 40 minutes......that lasted until the other end of the bridge when it said 58 miles, and traffic looked heavy. Bollocks. Never mind, a bit of fast filtering to get through the congestion and the the M20 was pretty quiet so we made the checkin with 5 mins to spare Smile Got chatting on the tunnel to a few bikers, but it was pretty quiet really for a friday afternoon.
30 minutes later and we emerge into the bright light of Calais. Again, a quick fuel stop, then an hours ride to Bruge on the lovely, smooth and quiet motorway.
We arrived in Bruge whilst it was still light and got checked into a hostel called Charlie Rockets which is right in the centre, about 100 yards from the famous clock tower. The hostel was basic, but friendly enough and dead cheap (12 Euro each). We picked it because it was described as biker friendly with secure parking, which turned out to be the chilled out barman telling us to just leave the bikes on the street as 'usually nothing will happen to them'
A quick freshen up and we headed into Bruge for something to eat. Its such a pleasant surprise to each in a European city - good food at decent prices. We sat at one of the restaurants in front of the clock tower and had a 3 course fixed price menu for 16 Euro each.
Bruges really is a very pretty place - I'll have to come back with the Mrs someday. » less
11 October 08,
Next morning we got up earlyish with bad hangovers from the Leffe we'd drunk a bit too much of the night before. We loaded the… » more
Next morning we got up earlyish with bad hangovers from the Leffe we'd drunk a bit too much of the night before. We loaded the bikes up and rode them into the main square again for breakfast and a few photos.
We had a fair mileage to cover today - not so much in outright numbers, but we wanted to avoid the motorways as much as possible and spend the day in the saddle taking in the french D roads and towns on the way to Caen.
We started off with the intention of visiting Hill 62, between Ypres and Menin where they have a WW1 museum and preserved trenches, but we just couldn't find it! Saw a few signs which then stopped, so eventually we gave up and headed toward Ypres where we stopped at one of the numerous Cemeteries. It really is astounding just how many of these are dotted around the Flanders countryside. They are in the middle of nowhere, and must be hardly visited, but are maintained immaculately.
The whole area was eerily silent, with a fine morning mist hanging over the ground.
Time to press on and we crossed the border back into France and headed for Sangatte. We'd heard there's a really nice coast road down to Boulogne. Sangatte itself is very nice, despite what you hear about it being off illegal immigrants. The road itself was very scenic and had a few twisties, but not a classic biking road.
We stayed on the more minor roads south of Boulogne before stopping at a typically rural little village cafe. Again, the food was good quality and cheap (total of 12 euro for both of us). People would have you believe that the french aren't friendly, but I just haven't found this at all. I cant really speak the language, but try to make an effort which I think is comical but appreciated. The old woman in the cafe never spoke a word of english but we all managed to make ourselves understood.
We briefly hit the motorway for about 60km to make sure we stayed on schedule and to fill up, then we returned to the D roads. The Sat nav was sending us all over the place, but we loved it, sometimes on single track roads which just seem to cut through farmers fields, other times on fast sweepers...
We then finally got back onto the motorway to enter Le Havre. They have an amazing bridge which was, until recently, the highest of its type in the world. It was supposed to be a toll bridge - I'm not sure if bikes are supposed to pay but we just followed a group of french bikers who didnt stop and flew through the cycling lane Smile
We intended to follow the coast road down to Caen, but a) the sun was in our eyes and it was blinding and b) it was saturday evening and the world and his dog were on the same roads, so after about 10 miles we headed to the main road and followed the Sat Nav to the Formula 1 hotel at Caen. These hotels are clean, basic accommodation and perfect if you dont need to be in the center of town and there are 2 or 3 of you sharing, as its only 32 euros per night for the room, so 16 each in our case. You get a double bed and a bunkbed (a flip of the coin secured the double bed for me Smile)
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12 October 08,
Only 289 miles today, which doesnt sound a lot, but we had a lot of sight seeing to fit in, so its a tour around… » more
Only 289 miles today, which doesnt sound a lot, but we had a lot of sight seeing to fit in, so its a tour around the beaches and then a last minute dash to Amiens so that the trip to the tunnel the day after is fairly short. So it didn't help when Dave set the alarm and we got up an hour late as his mobile was still on UK time
Sunday morning and the weather was sunny again...
First stop was Carentan, again via some interesting D roads, which will be familiar to anyone who has watched Band of Brothers. This town saw fierce fighting and was virtually destroyed, yet its been repaired so you'd think nothing ever happened.
Next stop was Saint-Mere-Eglise, a town famous for being the first liberated town in France. Its been featured in a few films - Band of Brothers and Longest Day to name a couple. The church is famous for a trooper getting snagged on the roof, and whilst many of his comrades were killed as the landed in the market square, he played dead and managed to escape in the confusion. There's a mannequin and parachute hung permanently from the church to remember it.
We had a look around the 101st Airborne museum, where they have loads of memorabilia and displays, including a Dakota that was airlifted into the museum by a Chinook. In all honesty we could have spent longer here, but we were on a bit of a whistle stop tour so never got chance to sit through the video presentations
A quick coffee, then it was a leisurely ride down to the coast.
First stop Point-du-hoc, where US rangers scaled the cliffs to take the point that overlooks the landing beaches further down. The scenery here is stunning - huge bomb craters pock mark the earth, and you think about the effort of climbing up the cliffs to take the well protected bunkers, and also the fear the germans must have had as those bombs pounded down on them.....
Next it was on to Omaha beach. I didn't realise how long it is - about 8km. At the northern end they have a monument to the national guard
Down on the beach and its hard to imagine the horror that this beach saw. Its a lovely beach, especially on such a sunny day
We pressed on to the centre, where the main memorial is, and had lunch at the D-Day inn :/
Amusingly, we kept on bumping into the same british bikers in Saint-Mere-Eglise, Omaha beach and then again, when we parked up at the Cemetery. Couple of blokes on ZX10R and a Bandit 1200. I didn't envy the guy touring on the ZX10!
The American cemetery is a beautiful place of remembrance. We started off in the visitor centre, which is very clean, white and brightly lit. They show lots of documentary footage and memorabilia, then take you through a corridor where the names of the dead soldiers are continually read out, into a room that gives some background to some of the ordinary soldiers. Its makes it all very personal, rather than just x number of deaths.
From there you walk out into the grounds and its just stunning. I defy anyone not feel some emotion when you see the rows up rows of absolutely precisely laid out crosses, overlooking the beach and sea beyond. Its like an optical illusion, for a moment all the crosses line up perfectly, then you move and the line up on another axis. That's set off by the main monument. Its hard to capture the scale on camera, because with a normal lense you just cant fit all the graves in, even of one of the cemeteries, and there are many. Anyway, heres a few pictures...
Back on the bikes and time for a bit of quiet contemplation as we rode down the coast road, past all the other beaches, finally stopping at Arromanches.
This is where the British Engineers floated over a huge concrete harbour from england, to aid in the debarquent of military hardware, Without this the push into into Europe wouldn't have happened, and it was a huge engineering achievement. A lot of the structure still remains out to see and on the beach.
Time was running late now. We had intended to stop at Gold and Sword beaches, but it was about 4pm and we still had a few hundred K to get to the hotel, so we made one last stop at Pegasus bridge. Anyone thats played Call of Duty will remember this! Its was captured by British airborne soldiers who landed in the marshes in gliders before taking the bridge and declaring the house next to it as liberated - one hour before D-Day.
The old woman who runs the cafe is the daughter of the man that owned it back in 1944, and its stuffed full of memorabilia. We stopped for a quick drink before hitting the motorway to Amiens.
The trip up the motorway started off fine. The Paege are billiard table smooth and quiet, and whilst not classic biking material, its quite serene compared to our over crowded, badly surfaced excuses for roads. The only downside is that they are not lit, and there's not even and cats eyes or colour co-ordination, so when it got dark it became a bit of a mission to just get to the Formula 1.
Once or twice I was nearly caught out thinking I was in the middle lane and almost rode onto the hard shoulder, which is edged by a deep gutter. Coupled to that I was getting bloody cold and tired! But anyway, at about 8:30pm (felt like midnight!) we finally arrived, grabbed a quick meal and got some sleep. » less
14 October 08,
Another motorway blast to get home today, but first we decided to get up early and take a look at the city centre. The omens… » more
Another motorway blast to get home today, but first we decided to get up early and take a look at the city centre. The omens weren't good, when as we road into town we saw that it was twinned with Darlington! I don't remember Darlington looking like this....
Although to be fair thats the nice parts of the city - a lot of its sprawling and industrial.
Then it was onto the motorway towards Calais, which was pretty uneventful, apart from a suicidal bird that decided to fly in front of me at 90mph. The bird lost - badly, exploding on my mirror stalk before the rest of it whacked into my shoulder.
Had to pull over to clean it off....it wont be doing that again!
We had a quick detour to the hypermarket in Sangatte, to pick up presents for the wives and kids, before getting back on the train, where we got chatting to some bikers who had just spent 6 days in the Black Forest. Nice lads, and a good crack for half an hour.
Just another 300 miles of crappy British motorway and we were home Smile
Thoughts on the trip -
The french are far friendlier than you tend to assume, and its nice to see the amount of respect they have for the Allied sacrifices, at least in Northern France anyway.
French bikers are very cool - I never tired of the side waves and foot wiggles, and its nice to see that everyone does it, no matter what you're riding.
I'd gladly have paid 10 euro to have removed 9/10ths of the traffic on the M1 on the way home. The sooner they bring in toll roads here the better for me.
Trips like this don't need to be expensive. I spent roughly:
Petrol: » less
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