Blair's Blog

After 3 days and 3 church towers (in 3 different countries), we decided to mix it up a bit, so we climbed up a windmill. We spent most of Thursday in Rotterdam around the old harbour and the Markthal with Hans & Connie (Brenda’s cousin and husband) and their son, Patrick. Mid afternoon, we struck out on our own and went to the Kinderdijk. It is a very historic area where 19 windmills remain in an area where they have been used for hundreds of years to drain the polders. Also, it is a huge, expensive trap for tourists.

The Markthal, where Hans demonstrated how to eat herring (haring) like a proper Dutchman.

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Brielle is the town in the area that the Langendoen family came from. We spent the afternoon walking around the town, looking for places that might have been familiar to Brenda’s dad, who was about 11 years old when the family immigrated to Canada. We saw the school and the church and we found ice cream, too.
Of course, we needed the ice cream since we had to climb the steeple of the church. 318 steps. The view was good though. Today was very clear and we could see the skylines of Rotterdam and den Haag.

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After everyone got 10 or more hours sleep last night (beginning by 7pm!) we got off to a fairly early start to the day with a run down the block to a pattisier where we got croissants and pastries for our breakfast.

We checked out of our hotel by 9am and spent the morning at Vimy Ridge. What a interesting experience.

From there it was about an hour and 45 minutes to Gent (Ghent) where we stopped for lunch.  Belgian waffles, what else?

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Well, after a long day of travel, we made it to Paris without any difficulties. It’s summer here! The fields are brown and it’s quite warm here. We got our rental (a Renault Scenic, scott) and hit the motorway to the north, arriving g in Arras by 2:30 in the afternoon.  We are beat, not much sleep on the plane, but our hotel is right on the main square and we are itching to explore a bit.

On the motorway.

The view out our hotel window, across the street above and down the road, below.

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