This morning I dove straight from Malpertuus campsite into the Lembeek forests in to spend over an hour on S-GR Uilenspiegel enjoying birdsong!
It then continued through rural lanes near Eeklo to the provincial domain The Leen. On the way, I passed a meadow specially sown with various cereal crops, poppies, cornflowers and sunflowers to create a perfect habitat for field birds, whose numbers have plummeted in recent years.
After the Veldekensvaart and the village Oostwinkel followed a beautiful stretch on rural gravel drives where you could still imagine yourself in the Middle Ages.
The distance turned out much longer than expected because GRs are very winding. The last few kilometres the feet started to protest a bit again. Trying to slow down a bit tomorrow, but finding a legal camping spot within walking distance is not always easy.
Flower meadow
Tuesday afternoon during lunch break in the camper van Els van Vlimmeren I could suddenly find my phone not charging anymore. The USB plug no longer went fully into the charging slot and did not make contact. This is a disaster, because I use it not only for photos, e-mail and social media, but also to navigate. The latter (Osmand) requires quite a lot of battery. We fiddled a bit with a needle in the USB slot because it was clearly dirty. Then, with some wiggling, it made charging contact again, but not stable enough. So on Wednesday morning we decided to take the campervan to a phone repair shop first thing. The nearest one was in Eeklo. The shop assistant there cleaned the lock a bit more thoroughly and now the phone charges a bit better, but still not like before.
During the walk from De Kleit, where Els dropped me back, to my next Welcome to my garden camping garden at Mira and Bert at Sijsele I did some thinking about what I would do best with that unreliable phone.
At St.-Kruis is a campsite and an AS Adventure shop. I am going to buy myself a cycling/hiking GPS there - which I had been planning for some time because of longer battery life - so I won't fall without navigation in the meantime.
Furthermore, I carry my old, still operational Motorola G5 to temporarily take over photo and communication duties in case my current phone breaks down.
Today's walk was along rural roads and some stately avenues. Pretty nice, that wider area around Bruges.
Around 10 o'clock I left Mira and Bert's place. Over the N9 it would have been only 4 km to camping Memling, but I took a diversion along an old railway line and the beautiful Ryckeveld forest. That was much more pleasant walking.
In the afternoon, I dragged to the AS Adventure 500 metres from the campsite to buy a GPS now that my phone cannot be 100% trusted. They no longer had the model I wanted in stock. I ordered one that will be delivered to a postal collection point in Ypres in a few days. Sometime next week I hope to be there, if the feet stay with me. Wonder if that mobile date with Bpost will work out....
It was convenient that today I had a city like Bruges passed. Dominique, who keeps the website up-to-date from Antwerp, had reported a problem with a photo gallery and I can only look at it from a laptop or PC. Stadsbib De Biekorf was open at 9:30am, so a little before 10am I was already there.
With 'one-time guest' status, I was allowed to use a PC there for just 1 hour. Stressful, especially when you have to start searching to get something fixed.
To maximise my hour, I decided to go to the toilet first. In coronaceen, this is no longer allowed in the library itself, you have to go to a 'urinal' (toilet cubicle) a bit further down the street... Once again, the whole ritual of disinfecting hands on leaving and re-entering the library, etc. Fortunately, I was allowed to leave my heavy rucksack in the library, because I would not have liked to stand in that urinal with it...
Not so cool, but all's well that ends well, at minute 55 I had found what was causing the error on the website and was able to get my 'across Bruges' journey (inside along the Ghent Gate and outside along the Ezel Gate) continue.
Before I left the outer city to travel along the canal Bruges-Ostend to my garden encampment at Mieke's in Varsenare walking, I went to eat a pasta on the terrace of a food and chat café. When I wanted to checkout, pinning proved impossible! Cash only. This was certainly not a small marginal establishment... Very strange, I think, now that in the corona era, the government still insists on paying digitally as much as possible. Fortunately, I still had one twenty note in my wallet.
I also became a little wiser today in terms of bridge building: the Scheepsdale Bridge is a tilting bridge which rests on the end of a large arch. When the bridge needs to be raised, the upright arch at the back tilts down and lifts the bridge at the other end. Fortunately, the photos below show it more clearly than my muddled technical explanation.
Around six o'clock I arrived at Mieke, my friendly garden hostess for tonight. In a wonderfully peaceful, rural setting: sheep, chickens, a pony and birdsong. What more could a person wish for? I wonder where all I would have had to camp (illegally) without the Welcome To My Garden platform.
Camping at Mieke's in Varsenare
This morning I had to be in the rain packing. My outer tent canvas was soaking wet, so I untied the still dry inner tent and packed both separately.
Soon after my departure, fortunately, the rain stopped. About the trip along the quiet Bruges-Ostend Canal is not much to tell. Walking 'zen' for a very long time at a stretch, one foot after the other and thoughts at zero, or almost. And so time and kilometres progressed, even faster than you would think during such a long trek alongside a canal. The only variety were waving boaters on passing yachts and (racing) cyclists flashing by.
Around 14:30 I took a break in cycle café 't Spaans Tolhuis, a building with history and two cool owners to which I will devote a separate blog post.
The last 10 km further followed the canal, which goes perpendicular to Ostend from Plassendale and takes on a more industrial character. Since 'bridges' are apparently becoming a theme now, I photographed a railway line plunging straight into the canal when the swing bridge is open.
This was followed by four monotonous kilometres along the R31, as the garden of Barbara, where I will be a garden guest tonight and tomorrow, is on the other side of Ostend, near the airport. Meanwhile, I could see dark grey clouds approaching in the distance....
Ten minutes after I arrived, it started raining. When I had put up the still wet outer tent, I noticed a tear of about 1.5 cm above. I tried to seal it with Duct tape, but on rubbing it dry before applying the tape, it tore about three more cm . Eventually I managed to get a tape stuck to the damp tarpaulin, but it certainly wouldn't be rainproof, even though pouring rain was forecast for tonight. So I drew up the poncho-tarp, which neatly covered the tear.
After an hour - it was still raining only moderately - Barbara and Peter came to see if everything was OK in the rain. For the time being it was, but they insisted on putting a bigger tarpaulin over the tent. We did, and shortly afterwards the rain did indeed start coming down in buckets.
The tarp and tarp from above are holding, but now I fear that the tent will soon end up in a puddle. I already packed everything back into the backpack as much as possible to keep it dry and, if necessary, to quickly move out to the gazebo.
During the night, fortunately, the water did not rise to my tent, although the ground became very soggy. At half past four, the pouring stopped and I got up for a sanitary stop. By then, Barbara and Peter's emergency sail was still up nicely. When I crawled out of my tent in the morning, the rear corner rudder, which was attached by a rope to the tree behind my tent, had been ripped off and everything had fallen forward, partly over my tent. The wind must have been the culprit, even in a walled garden. Curiously, I did not wake up from that....
This rest day was convenient because my tent in the storm a reasonable crack incurred and that I am in Ostend to try to tracking homeless people and interview.
So first thing in the morning was to rent a bike, go shopping as I was completely out of my food supply, and go to AS Adventure to buy a new tent, because another two months of travelling around rainy Belgium with a torn roof over my head is not something I can see. Spoiled brat that I am, realising that many people don't even have a torn roof over their heads.....
That is the case with Frank, a still quite young man from Nigeria who now lives on the streets of Ostend and told his story. I also spoke to two more homeless people, a woman who had been sleeping on a bench in Leopold Park but was chased away by the police combi, and a man who was begging in a shopping street. However, they preferred not to be interviewed.
After these emotionally heavy conversations for me, I lifted my spirits again at a tongue-in-cheek artwork by Guillaume Bijl, also in Leopold Park. Or how some people skip through life creating and almost playing on the same patch of land, while others carry heavy life rucksacks and have to endure a lot of hardship.
Frank from Nigeria, homeless in Ostend
16 September: Opening the door at Diamondway Buddhist Centre in Tallinn The centre's meditation sessions are open
