Bonjour Europe!

Hello everyone, and to those fellow bloggers in the UK, happy Bank Holiday weekend - spooky to think that the next Bank Holiday here will be Christmas Day!!

I have been away for a couple of weeks from Blogland as I was lucky enough to have 10 days with my family holidaying in Europe.  We set off in the middle of the night, and drove down to the ferry port in Dover.  After a bit of a wait at the port, we boarded the ferry at 6am and waved goodbye to the UK...

Farewell white cliffs of Dover...

Feeling excited as we cast away from the docks...

 Leaving the harbour...

the grey skies did not dampen our excitement...

Cheeky seagull hitched a ride, perhaps he wanted to swap chips for frites!

Sailing into the harbour at Dunkirk...

Once arriving in France we promptly set the sat nav for Belgium and headed for the village of Vielsalm, deep in the Ardennes.  It rained heavily on and off for the whole journey, but this did not bother us one bit - we were far too excited!

We stayed in a lakeside chalet, lovely views out of the window in the evening...

Next morning we discovered some geese had made their home on the lake, they were quite vocal...

A lot of fun was had feeding these guys, they could be quite intimidating at times though!

On Sunday we set out for a country walk, deep in the forests of the Ardennes...

The landscape is a working area too, with the forest carefully managed for logging purposes...

But it still remains blissfully tranquil...

We covered over 8 miles in total.  But although we were really enjoying these dream-like forest views, we were looking to catch a glimpse of something else...the excitement when we eventually spied, deep in the forest, what we were looking for cannot be described...

What do you think it was?  And why do you think we were in Belgium?

Back soon hopefully to explain!

Helenxx

Beautiful Belgium

Good morning everyone, hope you are well and enjoying a lovely weekend.

One of the reasons I have been away from Blogland over the past few weeks was due to a lovely 5 day trip to a European country I had never visited before - Belgium!  Such a lovely place, the people were so incredibly friendly and helpful.  For example, when asking directions in incredibly broken schoolgirl French, the lady being asked (who was just standing outside her house smoking a cigarette) didn't speak much English, but signalled us to wait, went next door, called a guy out (who was in the middle of eating his dinner) who, speaking perfect English, helped us with directions in the most courteous way possible.  The landlady of the little flat we rented for the duration of our stay ignored our impossibly late arrival (Sat Nav - brilliant for main roads but didn't show the side roads!) as if this was the original plan anyway, and welcomed us so very warmly and with impeccable courtesy. 

We stayed in a little town called La Roche en Ardenne - so pretty, but with a very harrowing history, having been all but destroyed in the Second World War (part of the Battle of the Bulge).  The townspeople honoured the British and American soldiers who liberated them - on every street corner we found memorials, plaques and tanks (this one has been restored as it received a direct hit and all inside were killed)

More memorials...

This is a memorial to the many civilians who lost their lives...

Hard to imagine now, the grief and desolation that engulfed this pretty, friendly little town...

Our accommodation was simple, but simply ideal...

Lovely garden and terrace, complete with a wood burning oven...

Friendly neighbourhood pets...

Little kitchenette and comfy living room...

Lovely views of the town from the window...

However, we did not spend that much time in this charming place, as we headed each day to somewhere else in the Ardennes...

Beautiful isn't it?  But we weren't there for a woodland holiday.  No, we were there for something quite different...so, lovely readers, where do you think we were, and for what reason?

Hopefully back soon to reveal all!!

Have a lovely Sunday, Helenxx