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M&D War Stories

Dave has been really looking forward to boy time looking at war stuff in Belgium and N. France - first stop Bastogne where he got all excited when he spotted a tank in the Square where the Battle of the Bulge was. Mogs tried to get him to climb up on the tank for a picture but he didn't want to join the 6 year old girl that was already up there!!

Tank at Bastogne

Waterloo battlefield - wet!  We went there but the pic is too gloomy and wet to put on!  We also tried stopping in Brugges but it was underwater and we couldn't get out the van!!  So moved on to the coast.

War Tour

Raversyde Atlantikwall - North Belgian coast

Over 60 bunkers, observation posts and artillery positions and the 2km of open or underground corridors make this one of the best preserved parts of the infamous German Atlantikwall.  Built by the Germans during the second World War from the French-Spanish border to Norway.

We had a 'war moment' - it was a great outdoor museum with underground rooms and trenches and corridors.

We were the only English people looking round:

There are 3 things not to mention when with Germans - World War 1, World War 2 and 1966 World Cup

Walking round the museum:

D: "Mogs - don't mention the war"
M: "Is this the part where we won?!"

Glares from the Germans just in front of us!!!

Here's a few (quite a few!) pics from the War Tour - we loved it and learnt a lot.

Soldier Boy!  D queued up with the other young little boys to try on the helmet!

 



Atlantic Wall from the outside

Anti aircraft gun

In the trenches

Original Bunker - inside it was all reconstructed

Plan of how the Wall and Barracks looked

re-enactments of the underground rooms - Pay day

Below - there's a uniform from an actual soldier who's bed it was

Boys and Toys

We are trying to put on a recording from the Tour about Rommel - not sure if it's gone on!

Dave has loads more pics on his phone if anyone is interested!!

M: No....not one bit but she did enjoy it.

Belgian Choc

Dave is in heaven - every other shop is a chocolate shop!  The only choc Mogs likes is Belgian posh choc so we treated ourselves to a small box of chocs that cost over 5 euros. Mogs had to hide the box as in 2 minutes Dave had eaten half of them!!  Sulky D throwing his toys out the pram and searching for the chocs :)

Ypres

Ypres city is lovely with reconstructed medieval buildings and the entire cathedral was rebuilt as shown below.

 

The Cathedral - before and after

 

 

 

Menin Gate

The Menin Gate Memorial in Ypres is dedicated to the British and Commonwealth soldiers who were killed in the Ypres Salient of WW1 and whose graves are unknown.  There are 54,896 signatures on the wall - stairs go up each side and are covered in signatures. Each night at 8pm the traffic is stopped and The Last Post is played - we didn't stay for the evening ceremony but it must be very moving and is quite appropriate to this blog post as it will also be our Last Post.

 



Dunkirk

Dave really wanted to visit Dunkirk but this was all that was there. 

Moving on.....

Calais Beaches

We're not really impressed with the North French coast - the places we have been this summer have been so awesome, Calais and the surrounding coastline isn't great.  Especially living in Bude as well - the weather has changed here and is a lot cooler and cloudy so instead of staying in this area for a final bit of sunbathing as we'd hoped to do we have decided it's time to head home to the white cliffs of Dover.  We could see them just across the sea.

After loading up Vannie with wine and beer at the Calais hypermarket we headed for the Channel Tunnel.  Dave had looked up prices on the internet and found the Tunnel to be 65 euros where the Ferry was 85 so with our budget well blown, we decided to go under the sea and not over it.

BUT....queued in the 'no ticket' queue - being a Saturday in August it was well busy - got to the kiosk only to be told the price was 330 euros - EEK! We can't afford that! So we had to have an EXIT ticket and go to the reject aisle with everyone watching - Oh Look - those people are not allowed back into England!!  Bugger...

In the Tunnel queue - we had to exit off to the right with 15 rows of people watching!

So off to the ferry we went - not quite 85 euros either but half the price of the tunnel

Au Revoir France!

 

 

 

Final Route - Austria to Calais

 

 

 

Hello England!

 

 

Duty free bags in hand!

 

 

 

We've reached the end of our European Tour - what a great time we've had - the World Tour starts next.....

This travelling is hard work - we need a holiday now!!!

 

 

 

Wampach - The Legend!

Instead of heading north in Germany we decided to go across to France as Ulli and Rita had said there was a lovely mountain route - this turned out to be another scary road for Mogs!!  This means we don't have any pics of the route but it was quite stunning.

After the hot weather in Freiburg we had a bit of a change and stormy weather came.  We always seem to have rain in France!

We found a campsite but it was really busy and after one night there we made a last minute decision to leave - had 10 minutes to pack up and make a quick escape - we're getting pretty good at packing things up quickly!  Time to head nearer to Luxembourg and made a stop at a place called Nancy further up in France.

We stayed at a site there for a few days - free wifi! Biked into the city one day - it was further than we thought but worth the visit - the centre was full of golden buildings in the square.

Nancy - the golden city

Vannie / Vany

Vannie has done us proud on our trip so far - when we were in the UK for her MOT we got a lovely new duvet cover thanks to Les and Kirk - we have also put up our prezzys from Annie and G and Sam and Kez at the back of the van - Dave needs a bosom for a pillow!!

 

 

 

With Mogs solar lights put out by the doors - as soon as we park up anywhere we are 'home'! 

Time to move on to Luxembourg - On the way we went through a village called Vany - had to get a pic! Perhaps we should have stopped here - Vannie wanted to stop but we had to move on!

We couldn't find anywhere else in France we fancied staying so carried on driving till we reached Luxembourg - first stop was at a yacht club just over the border where campervans could stop in the car park - very pretty place  in the wine growing area of Luxembourg on the Moselle River.

Schengen - in the Moselle Valley

 

In Luxemboug and it's boiling again - spent the first 2 days chilling in the sun and topping up tans.

Mr Wampach - the Legend!

Our friend Steve Wampach - the man who knows how to party hard in Luxembourg - he rang us up and said 'we party hard all days and nights - sex, drugs and rock n roll!'

Steve has been on our blog previously - we met him last year in Spain at Mog's friend Sally's birthday bash.

BBQ and Party Time with Mr W and friends and "Non Bon" the dog - No Balls in Luxemburgish

 

 

Very cool place!

 

 

We lasted an evening and then had to have a night in watching the English TV that Dave's managed to find now on the satelllite dish!!

Luxembourg City

We had our own tour guide - by bike - Mr W showed us the sights of Luxembourg city.  We were planning a slow cycle to the city to have a look around on our rusty old bikes. Along comes Mr Wampach fully kitted out in his professional gear on a super fast bike!! HELP! He is well fit - our short legs had trouble keeping up - he did slow down for us though and showed us round the city - beautiful city.

Wampach - the tour guide

 

 

View from the top - bit like a little 'toy town'

 

 

The Palace

 

The Casements - underground tunnels built in the rocks - miles long and a long way down!

 

http://www.aluxembourgattraction.com/luxembourg-attractions/petrusse-casements.htm

 

 

 

 

Castles and Villages

 

Luxembourg may be small but it's full of lovely villages and castles - we found a few and searched for ages for a waterfall that looked stunning in the books - couldn't find it!  Probably due to Mog's navigation skills yet again.....

 

 

 

 

 

Vianden

The prettiest village in Luxembourg



 

 

 

 



After partying and driving through some lovely parts of Luxembourg it's time to move on to Belgium and North France - the final part of our tour.

 

 

 

Fun in Freiburg

We love Freiburg - fab city. After getting a bit lost we met our friends Ulli and Rita in town - they had told us the name of a statue in the centre to meet at, but we thought it was the name of a bar and had written it down wrong anyway - the tourist information centre couldn't even help but we found the girls in the end!  They took us to a typical German beer garden high up in the city with great views - everywhere we went we were introduced as Die Englanderrs - we felt like celebrities as everyone wanted to try out their English on us - this happened for the next 4 days as Ulli and Rita put up with us for that long!!

Prost!

View from the beer garden

Right Said Fred

Does anyone know what happened to the group 'Right Said Fred'?! We do - they are in Freiburg on a Tuesday night - went to see a group with the girls and one of their friends is exactly like him - we had to show them on the internet and they believed us! But he'd broken his leg for this performance and couldn't strut his stuff 'on the catwalk' but he was 'so sexy for his cat'!! Older UK readers of the blog will understand this!!

Right Said Fred is sitting down with his leg in plaster

video of the group doing it 'Their Way!' Most of the songs were in English

Girls on a night out!

While we were in Freiburg the new future King was born - They asked us what the new Prince was going to be called - guess what D said - King Dave of course!!  Some believed him for a while......

Here's a few pics and a video of Freiburg - if you are in the Black Forest make sure you visit

Cathedral

There's a market every day by the cathedral with lovely flower stalls and loads of sausage stalls - brought back memories of the nudist beach!! we did like the Currywurst - sausage and curry sauce.  Ulli also made us a local dish called Wurstsalat - mixture of special ham, cheese, gherkins and oil - it was lush.

Smells of flowers and sausage!!

Dave on the Balcony before a fab BBQ evening

Speaking German

Ulli and Rita and her German friends found the following link very funny - you may have to be a Facebook user to see it - it shows how harsh the German language sounds compared to other European countries we have been in - we had great fun with the girls about this.

<iframe src="https://www.facebook.com/video/embed?video_id=1399613733590263" width="400" height="224" frameborder="0"></iframe>

Freiburg Kurry Haus

We had the best curry ever at the local Kurry Haus - a real treat after all the sausage we've had!!

Dave missing his English food! This was just the starters - the mains were as good - YUM!

Dave enjoys his ice cream again in an 'ice cream' cafe that did loads of different ice creams

Spaghetti Ice Cream!

Ausfahrt!

Driving through Germany on the autobahns we kept seeing signs for Ausfahrt and thought that must be a very big town as it seemed to have loads of roads leading to it.  After about 30 miles we realised it's the German for Exit......doh!!

Pool just for Women

The weather was boiling during our stay in Freiburg and one afternoon we headed for the local pool - met Ulli there who took Mogs in the women's only pool - the only one in Germany I think she said.  Never been in a pool with so many women - it was strange but cool - Dave would have loved it but he wasn't allowed in!!

Everyone rides by bike in Freiburg - had to keep your wits about you and avoid the trams - we felt like proper locals bombing round the city on our bikes with Rita who knew all the shortcuts!

Bikes everywhere

Medieval town Schafen

Trip during our stay to a nearby really pretty medieval town called Schafen

Schafen

Had a great swim one day in a local lake with Ulli and had a lovely time for the whole of our stay with them.  Dave did a bit of leccy work in their house - may get him back in work mode for our return to the UK! He also gave a stunning performance of the German song he'd learnt on the guitar with Mogs singing along in her best German accent and we also did an English version of the song that the girls loved.  I'm afraid the video won't load - well that's what Dave says!!

Little Woodstock

On our final night in Freiburg we went to a Little Woodstock hippy festival in a field on the outskirts of town - what a night!!

Arrived at the field - vans and tents everywhere parked up for the night but managed to squeeze Vannie into a spot - youngsters were all very impressed with our rum optic in the van! Dave started inviting them all back for a party later on - is that a good idea?!

Video when we arrived:

It was all free and very well set up with drinks, veggy food (not free but cheap!), groups playing, kids games, great lighting when it got dark - all ages were there - granny too with her own joint!

There were lights in the trees made from recycled plastic bottles - all very 'save the planet!' Looked stunning

Video during the evening:

It was all getting very hot and steamy with weed and beer flowing then the heavens opened up and we had a lightening show and torrential downpour! Everyone rushed to the tents but Dave and Ulli dived under a table!!  Funny!  It was a good night despite the rain and we staggered back to the van at some point.....

Dave and Ulli keeping outa the rain!

The morning after it was time to move on - we loved our stay in Freiburg - thanks girls!