August 18, 2009
Camping at Helfaut
It seems to have taken us a very long time to go only 39km.
When it had cooled down a bit we went to bed and went straight to sleep and as we had expected it was a very long night. Awoke about 6.s0 and it was very foggy and the tent very wet but amazingly went to sleep again until about 8.30. All this meant that we didn’t get away until around 10am after packing away a rather wet tent and eating our breakfast of orange juice and ‘toast’.
The way was through pleasant farms of harvested wheat and sugar beet. It was up hill and down dale and some of the gills too steep to ride especially as my gears are still playing up and I am not keen on Tricia pushing herself at the moment so we just get off and push. Then there is a fast downhill on the other side. After about an hour we found a small bar for a coffee which was absolutely full of smokers.
The route took us up through a wood off road. It should have been easy but it wasn’t and we walked for a long time and when we finally emerged onto the road we had no idea where we were. We came across a rather strange old man with about 20 kittens and he was able to direct us the correct way.
The last bit was easier and quite a bit quicker. It was interesting to pass the Cupola where V2s were launched in WW2 but we didn’t go in as we were keen to find a place to stay. After a long steep uphill we found the camping ground at Helfaut which was very quiet and with a very nice man in charge ( only 11E with 5E for wifi). We set up and had a shower and I went to the shop about 2km down the road to get something for a meal. Tricia seemed to come through the day well, she only had one episode of feeling exhausted but her heart rate was only 120 and rapidly dropped to under 100 so she should be fine
Today's ride: 39 km (24 miles)
Total: 330 km (205 miles)
| Rate this entry's writing | Heart | 1 |
| Comment on this entry | Comment | 0 |