26 to 30 April - Finishing up in France, the first time

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After finishing up our ANZAC day festivities with the Pagetts, and with the calvados still flowing through our veins, we travelled the sort distance back across the Belgian border to Bruges. It was nice to be in a country where people understood the english language (I suppose it has to be that way cause no one speaks belgian or flemish)and where road signs actually made sense. Apart from french drivers, the biggest challenge on the roads is coming to grips with the signage. Oh well we've come this far without any major hiccup!

We took a room at the Cavalier Hotel. Its close to the centre of the old town and run by a very eccentric middle aged lady who took a lot of time fussing over her guests - always good. After decamping we took a nice stroll around the old town. Its a beautiful place, just gushing with history and beautiful old buildings and canals clustered around the market square. Whilst a lot of the shops were the usual high end stuff targetting the tourists, of particular interest to us were the range of amazing little antique shops and boutiques which we spent a bit of time in. In one shop I spotted a case with a large AK47 assault rifle. It was made of glass and was full of vodka. The perfect gift for a significant milestone I reckon. After picking up a rather nice piece of tapestry, we climbed St Martin's Belfry located on the market square. Its a structure that dates back to the medieval days and has 48 bells on top of the belfry. After climbing up the 366 steps through a very tight staircase (you can imagine the traffic going up and down this), we heard the bells being rung from about 5 metres. Very intimate.

The next day we did a bit more exploring of the "nooks and crannies" of Bruges before hopping into the car for the trip back to France. Instead of taking the direct route back to Argenton down by Paris, we decided to head back along the coastline through Upper Normandy. Not alot to see except for rolling pasture that reaches right to the coastline, at times there is no hint that beyond the pasture is a cliff that drops 100m down to the sea. We stopped at a little town called Ault, a run down little town with much potential and spectacular views of the Normandy coastline, before continuing on and stopping at Fecamp, the home of Benedictine. Had to sample a drop in the evening.

The next day we drove the rest of the way back to Argenton, arriving in the early afternoon. We'd done a fair bit of driving but Ellen and I weren't too shagged and so in the evening we dragged ourselves off to Chateroux to watch L'Berrichone beat the upstarts from RC Lens 1 nil in the football. That was good because we'd invested a few dollars in club shirts and scarves. This time we decided to take the cheap seats with the hard core supporters behind the goals so was expecting some raucous behaviour, particularly as we were thoroughly padded down by security before being allowed in. Not on your life. These country people are very well behaved and the odd display of exhubirant support really stood out. The travelling supporters from Lens on the other hand were a slightly different case. The knot of supporters were encased in a cage in the corner of the ground surrounded by heavily armed police. Despite it being just above zero degrees, a large number of them had stripped themselves to just their pants and were making quite a large racket. Ellen observed that it was just the big blokes with large bellies that were stripped half naked. I suppose they had that extra layer to ward themselves off from the cold. After the game the travelling supporters were kept restrained in the cage until the ground had emptied of the 7000 home supporters before being escorted to their buses for the long ride home to Lens. The security measures are all normal protocol for football games in Europe, but its hard to see the local supporters ever being bothered engaging in anything approaching hooliganism.

We were approaching our last days in France before heading off to visit Slovenia. After some agonising Ellen had decided to accompany us to Slovenia but she was thoroughly sick of the long car trips. She will instead take the trip by train from Paris, staying a few days with family friend Agnes before meeting us in Ljubljana. Gina and I will make the journey in Le Petit Pois.

Before heading off we had a celebration dinner at one of our favourite places, L'Escapade. As it was my birthday, Helen and Pierre had arranged to pay for the meal, which was really nice of them. I lashed out on my favourite offal dishes, a salad of ducks gizzards and a main of lamb kidneys. The meal was finished off with a strawberry torte topped with a big candle that sparkled and fizzed. The complete meal.

We were now ready for the next stage of our journey.

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