By Ben Ade The streets of Belgian towns have a great amount of artful decoration, such as the buildings pictured in the city of Mons. I have a nagging feeling we may have missed reports on a country somewhere? Anyway, Belgium was quite a charming wee place. We spent a couple of days in their lake district, taking long walks and exploring various interesting sites. Although Belgium technically forbids wild camping, they have plenty of provided areas to free camp and its people have a refreshingly friendly attitude. These lakes have just such a provision, lovely green fields with a track leading in, surrounded by woodland and fringing the shores of perfectly clear waters. The weather has been cooling recently, must be getting close to the familiar British Empire I suppose, although sunshine was still a plenty for the time being.
A particularly unusual vehicle was spotted the next day, appearing to be an entire canal boat fused to the road gear of an old bus, complete with a huge V8 engine which resonated a throaty growl. Thinking this to be an advertising machine of sorts and surely not water going, we watched it pull off the main road to park. Hold on, rather than slowing to park, the machine is speeding up and building revs in the direction of the huge lake! A loud crashing, splashing noise emanated as the coach length, road going boat hit water with force and two huge outboard motors engaged as it continued happily across the lake. We later learned that this cracking piece of engineering is known as 'Le Crocodile Rouge', and quite a popular tourist ferry. Another interesting fact about this country is they fit streetlights to most of the country lanes and main roads, not just within towns. These otherwise traditional lanes and roads make for pleasant driving with plenty of varied sights throughout. The country is, however, quite small so you can very easily drift into neighbouring EU lands without realising!
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