Tag Archives: alle

Saturday 26 November 2016 – IT’S NOT BEEN MY LUCKY DAY TODAY!

I went out for my bag of chips tonight as usual, only to find that the chip shop is closed for its annual holidays this weekend.

But no matter – I went off to Bohan. I’d heard that there was a football match on tonight at 20:00.

I arrived there at 19:30 and found a signpost to the football ground – exactly where I had expected it to be from a quick view of an aerial photograph. I could even see the floodlights too, which confirmed that a night match was eminently possible. But when I arrived, the place was in total darkness. and that’s how it stayed.

I went for a drive up along the river into France and toured around for half an hour, but on the way back I passed by the ground again and – still in darkness.

bohan belgique belgium october octobre 2016I went back to the centre of the town of Bohan and parked up Caliburn in order to go for a wander around and see what was going on. And I was surprised to find that, for such a small town, it was a thriving hive of industry.

There is a small Delhaize supermarket for a start, and then one or two other shops including a boulangerie, and more than half a dozen restaurants, including a pizzeria which was interesting to discover.

I made a good note of all of these. The supermarket is enough to entice me back on Monday to do some shopping instead of going to Alle – it’s about the same distance. And I’ll be able to see the town in the daylight too.

bohan belgique belgium october octobre 2016But my walk did take me to a cafe-type of place stuck in a corner of the square. This was a fast-food restaurant too and they served up some of the nicest chips that I have ever had – and that’s saying something. And so I had my chips after all.

A shame about the football but at least it brought me out of my cocoon and into a new situation and a new town with some good facilities. And as I said – I’ll be back in the daylight to have a better look. Just you wait to find out that Monday is its official day of closing. That’s what usually happens, isn’t it?

Once I had managed to drop off to sleep, I had a really good night. Well away in fact without a single disturbance.

I’d been on my travels too – off visiting my brother of all people and then I had to return because I was taking an exam which consisted of three subjects, for which I was not prepared at all. There were half a dozen of us and as we were glancing through the question paper I suddenly realised that I had left the notes that I needed, along with my house keys, in my jacket which I had left at my brother’s. I had to telephone him to arrange for him to bring them up, but it meant that I would have to leave the room in which case I would be disqualified and have to resit it. But if I didn’t have my notes I would fail, in which case I would have to resit it anyway.
Sometime later I was driving Claude and Françoise somewhere and dropped them off where they had to walk about 100 yards to wherever they were going. They told me how I could work my way back through the village to return to where I had come from, but I wondered why I couldn’t simply do a U-turn and go back the way that I came.

First down to breakfast, and before the staff yet again, and by the time I’d finished I was still alone. But at least the old man who waits on had a little chat to me, which made a change.

And apart from talking to Liz, I cracked well on with my web pages. I’ve arrived in Happy Valley-Goose Bay in Central Labrador and I reckon that I’ll be there for a good few days now. There’s tons of stuff to write about, including how two countries walked in to a third country and built a wharf and an airfield, without even a word to the country concerned.

Later on, I had a shower, washed my clothes for the last couple of days and put on some clean ones. And then seeing as the noxious brat had been let loose in the lounge, I hit the road for my appointment with destiny.

But well-fed and watered, I’m back here now. Another early night, I hope, Then we’ll see if I can have a really good night’s sleep again. I feel much better when I’ve had a decent sleep and I’ve already had a little crash out just now.

Monday 21st November 2016 – TODAY IS THE DAY …

… that I celebrate – if that is the correct word to use – the first anniversary of my last night at home.

And what a tumultuous year it has been too. I’ve spent nights sleeping at friends, in hotels in France, Belgium and the Netherlands, in hostels, on floors, in hospitals, in student houses, but never again at home and how I am depressed as the seriousness of my position dawns on me.

Am I destined to spend the last years of my life living out of a suitcase and ambling aimlessly around around North-West Europe? What a horrible thought.

But one thing that I have learnt as I’ve been travelling around is that there’s no place like home. I have accordingly for the next three months and maybe even more, negotiated a good place in the hostel back at Leuven. It might not be much, and nothing like what I was hoping to have, but it’s the nearest place to home that I have right now. I have negotiated a good price with the option of a renewal, and in exchange I’ll be expected to do a little work, but I’m as happy as I could be with that.

I had a really late night last night and as a result was in no fit state at all when the alarm went off. It was a struggle to go down to breakfast (I was third, and yet there before the staff was) and then I crashed out again afterwards for a while.

The internet was, well, working something-like and so I found another pile of stuff about Labrador. And that took me ages too. For lunch, I finished off the bread that I had bought in Sedan at the LeClerc on Friday, so after lunch I nipped into Alle to the boulanger for a big loaf and across the road to the Spar for a lettuce.

orchimont vresse sur semois belgium october octobre 2016On the way back, I took a diversion and climbed high into the Ardennes to visit Orchimont.

I don’t know whether to call it a town or a hamlet or what because these days it’s been absorbed into the commune of Vresse sur Semois, and ohhhh! What a come-down that must be for the place because 800 years or so ago it was by far the biggest town in the area.

orchimont vresse sur semois belgium october octobre 2016Perched up here in its steep escarpment, it was at one time the capital of this region and had a fortified castle and city walls to defend itself and the region.

All of tha changed in 1635 when Louis XIII of France laid siege to the town, which was part of the Spanish Netherlands at that time.

fortification orchimont vresse sur semois belgium october octobre 2016

He brought 35,000 soldiers with him apparently, and no town can withstand that kind of siege for long. It fell on 11th May of that year and was burnt, with all of the fortifications destroyed.

When the road was brought here in 1878, it went straight through whatever remained of the remains of the fortifications. All that is left is this, and I’m not even sure if these are original.

orchimont vresse sur semois belgium october octobre 2016But you can see what a stunning defensive site the place occupies. This is the road in from the south.

The roads from the west and east are equally impressive – in fact the road in from the north – which you might have noticed in the first photograph, is the only one that is reasonably accessible.

The spur of the rock overlooking the road that we can see just here was crying out for a castle to be built on it, if you ask me. Any Medieval lord bent on increasing his power in the region, and some of these medieval lords were as bent as they come, would have been proud to have had his castle here.

eglise st martin orchimont vresse sur semois belgium october octobre 2016There’s a church here too, and I asked a local yokel who was taking a most extraordinary interest in me, to whom it was dedicated.

But he wasn’t much of a vocal local yokel and told me to go and enquire in Vresse sur Semois. Miserable ghit!

But seeing as how everything at Orchimont is St Martin this, St Martin that, I shall have a wild guess.

What I do know is that it’s far from being the original church. It dates from 1863 apparently, although I imagine that there has been a church here for 1500 years before that.

christmas trees sapin de noel orchimont vresse sur semois belgium october octobre 2016One thing that I have noticed since I’ve been out here has been an endless stream of farm tractors with trailers fully-laden with Christmas trees disappearing into the mists.

What I hadn’t realised is that Orchimont is the Christmas Tree capital of Belgium and North-East France. There must be 5,000 here all parcelled up ready for shipping.

That’ll keep them out of mischief.

With the laptop being a bit flaky just now, I’ve done a major back-up this evening just in case, and now having done some more research I’m off to bed.

I’ve had nothing to eat tonight so I’ll make a butty quickly and that will be that. I’m not up to much else.