The reason for this entry to be in English is to be able to thank the people who we have met on our last part of the journey, who in some way or another has guide, assisted or sheltered us on our way. We would also like to send some friendly thoughts to our finnish friend who lost his credit card, and we hope he's doing better progress now than when we met him almost two weeks ago.
Firstly, we would like to thank Herman and Ellen of Deurningen, Holland, who in our worst misnavigation came along on their bikes and was willing to guide us several kilometers on the way and saved us at least half an hour on the bikes that evening. We were impressed by the seemingly effortless way they maintained high and perfectly synchronized speed on uneven and narrow gravel tracks on which we had to traverse with much more sweat and force (could be because of the luggage...).
Secondly we would like to thank Erik of Zoersel, Belgium, who without the slightest request from us gave us a tour of the town Westmalle, showed us the outside of the Westmalle Trappist Monastery and it's Brewery, and most surprisingly offered us shelter in his house for the night! As an alternative of camping in the wild or going 30 km to Antwerpen, we were grateful for this, and none the least for his hospitality with regards to food, information and maps to Brussels! It made our journey several notches better than without!
Now for a review of what has happened over the last leg of the journey:
After Hamburg we cycled most of the road to Bremen, to stay at a campingsite just east of the city. We tried to keep to the bicycle-route, but after cycling several kilometer into the woods, we met this construction worker, telling us to come back in 2010, when new the bridge was supposed to be ready. So much for bicycling-maps...
Passing to Bremen went slowly and we camped just a bit west. The third day after Hamburg was a bit more interesting. We arrived at Haselynne, still in Germany. There we found this really cozy german gasthaus. A main dish, with 50% asparagus, was both interesting and good. To dessert we had strawberry with ice cream. Delicious! Also starring was 3 different beers and a friendly staff.
The day after, we passed into Holland (without noticing it for a while though). Here we met Herman and Ellen, as mentioned above. Thats the only reason we got to the camping place in time. Thanks! The dutch were friendly and the words "good morning" is almost the same in dutch and norwegian :)
The next day we thought it strange for a dutch pizzeria to have a menu in german... It took an hour before noticing we were back in germany. Oops... We got out before dusk and camped back in holland again.
The real interesting bit was Westmalle. There we had planned a small stop to see the monastery and to drink the local Westmalle trappist. We just was giving up hope to find a camping site nearby and was readying to go to Antwerpen, a bit detour, when we met Erik.
Erik came over to us and soon offered to show us the monastery, to find a good place to take a beer and even a place to sleep for the night. We sooned discovered that Erik too was a bicyclist, and maybe a tad more crazy then us too. He cycled norway from south to north and back again, 6500km... In norwegian terrain...
Now, that is a trip! We had a couple of good beers, a nice third breakfest, a first dinner and a good cup of coffee together. A highly appreciated pause from the usual camping and tent life.
With Kjetil standing up in record time, before 7.30, things went pretty fast. We were outside Brussels at aboutly 3 pm, and we only used a couple of hours finding the Grand place without a map, except our 1:200 000 Holland/Belgia-map. Brussels was the size of a matchbox on that... Thanks to all who guided us in the city, we arrived at grand place. Been there, done that, whats next? :p
Taking an hour off, tasting the local beers and getting to the local hotell (read: Ragnvalds friend Andreas` mother, Ann-Kjerstin, offered us a house). Coming there, putting the bikes away, showering and a good meal. Thats a luxury hotell, allright!
We`re occupying the house till friday, to see brussels and relax. The plan includes potato chips, two sofas, at least one movie and an unknown quantity of beer. With time to spare.
Untill later in the week
Kjetil & Ragnvald
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