Stevensweert - Tongeren: hello Belgium - A Flanders Fling

May 26, 2017

Stevensweert - Tongeren: hello Belgium

I am happy to say that Belgium wasn't living up to its reputation for cold and rainy summer days. We woke up to a sunny morning and the world was looking good! Our B&B, de Klaproos, was a fun and quirky place set in a romantically overgrown garden. We ate breakfast out on the terrace, and I think Dutch breakfasts beat German breakfasts. One of their specialties are chocolate sprinkles to put on your bread and butter. Among other things on the table, there was stroop Rob had made himself, a kind of apple syrup, a bit like molasses but better.

A variety of chocolate sprinkles to put on your bread and butter

B&B de Klaproos and Rob's yellow van that he drove me to the hospital in

Before we left Stevensweert we cycled through its quiet streets.

For a while we followed the course of the Maas, later we were on the bank of the King Albert Canal. Although it was on our route, we decided not to include Maastricht on today's ride but stayed on its outskirts and then headed west toward Tongeren where we had booked a room for the night. In spite of ample experience with bicycle touring in Europe, when planning our trip this time I was anxious about finding rooms every night. Therefore we booked rooms for the first six days, thinking that would be reassuring and give us time to ease into our tour. I'm glad I did it, but it was probably unnecessary. Later on we only booked for the following day. In the old days, we used to wait until we reached our destination to look for lodging. With age I have become more cautious.

Sign showing the way to the bicycle and pedestrian ferry

We got off the ferry and were in Belgium!

Our first impressions of Flanders were very positive. We didn't see much more than bicycle paths today, but that was fine with us.

We had kind of a fancy (i.e. pricey) hotel for the night - I hadn't been able to find anything else online - and it was very nice indeed. We parked our bikes and were within walking distance of the center of town. We walked, we took pictures and we settled on a place to eat.

First impressions in Belgium - here in Tongeren

And now for some Belgian beer! Actually, I'm not really a beer buff, I just like to try new and different things. It tasted good and is heady stuff! The vast majority of beers have alcohol contents of 4 to 6 percent (for example, Budweiser has 5 percent). The Trappiste Rochefort had 11.3 percent, the Chimay 9, enough to knock me on my noggin after a day cycling in the sun.

Today's ride: 63 km (39 miles)
Total: 338 km (210 miles)

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