In which Sid and Doris find less than they hoped in Sint Kathelijne and Mortsel but enjoy an early visit to Antwerp on the Scheldt (or Schelde).
The Ve Hotel gets a huge write-up from S and D but we have painted our wagon. Doris has found a route out of town that does not retrace our steps as the tour map suggests, as if we would.
We leave past St Romboutstoren. The 97 metre tower was planned in 1452 to be higher so is perhaps incomplete. Anyway it’s the biggest thing for a long way around.
Our first planned stop is Sint Kathelijne Waver with its Ursuline convent and school. Belgian Bike Tours describe this as a successful blend of art nouveau, neo-Gothic, Neo-Empire and Art Deco and say it shouldn’t be missed. We are agog. Until we find it is only ever open on Sundays at 14:30 and has to be booked a week in advance, so none of the people on these tours which always get here on Mondays will ever be able to see the architectural wonder… Sid took a photo from the outside while Doris searched for a picture of what we did, alas, miss.
Onwards to Lier with the offer of another Grote Markt and a cafe stop. Every single town we go through has a Grote Markt and usually a spare square as well to provide a backup set of cafes, tourist entertainment, impressively uniform architecture with large public spaces and opportunities to get run over by Belgian housewives cycling heavy sit-up-and-beg bikes rather faster than Sid and Doris do. Say what you like about the Belgians, they do a good square. (SWYLATBTDAGS)
En route Doris stops to get this picture of a cyclist-oriented vending machine with inner tubes, snacks, tyre patching kits, energy drinks, and, should all else fail, beer.
In the 1860s the Belgians built a ring of forts to defend Antwerp. Recall also that since 1839’s Treaty of London Belgium was neutral, as guaranteed by the Great Powers. In 1914 Belgium mobilised and reminded everyone about the excellent treaty. Germany invaded and the forts fell in October. And when Sid and Doris attempted to get in to Fort 4 at Mortsel it was mostly shut up, although there was a subterranean corridor full of information boards.
We need to explain that we are now in Flanders, the Flemish-speaking part of Belgium. Belgium is actually composed of three provinces (a useful pub quiz answer btw): Flanders, where all the labels are in Flemish and only Flemish, Walloon, ditto French, and Brussels itself, where everything, absolutely everything is labelled in two languages and there is probably a state-mandated app which randomly chooses which language is printed first. Anyway here we are in Flanders and the information boards of which there are many are only in Flemish. Flemish looks rather like Dutch to the uninformed, and new travellers may decide to use the “if only it were English” school of travellers’ translation. Which works well for some words (tomate, smokey BBQ saus, friet, mayonnaise en ketchup, picking some at random off a nearby menu) and then comes to a crashing halt for information boards about nature reserves and old forts and so on. Very frustrating. Here is an explanation about Fort 4’s current state of renovation:
Renovatiewerken
Het Reduit van FORT 4 krijgt nieuw dak! Omwille van de werfzone is het Reduit tijdelijk niet toegankelijk voor rondleidingen. Rondleidingen zijn wel nog mogelijk, maar zullen korter zijn.
You can feel the meaning nudging at the back of your brain as you decode the odd word but… Onwards, and wikipedia-wards. Meanwhile here are some pics of the renovatiewerken which are still very much werken in progress.
This lovely villa earlier in the day also passed without any enlightenment as to its purpose (there was a WW1 information board showing it very badly damaged), but it is such a perfect time to take a picture, as the leaves bursting out will obscure it in just a few days, that we have included it anyway.
From the fort we are no more than a run along the rail- and canal-side cycle routes into Antwerp where we find the Van der Valk hotel out on the ring road. This is as we expected. The welcome is friendly, the early check-in is cheerfully organised and fortunately Sid’s large panniers include a set of town-visiting kit as the luggage is still being transported by the Invisible Luggage Elves. We are soon showered and changed and on the Number 24 tram into town.
Antwerp gets a quick look around. Monumental railway station, tick. Statue of camel, tick. Groete Markt, well why did you bother to ask, this was the third or fourth one we found in our wanders. Mix of traditional and modern architecture, tick. Sid poking his pointy nose towards an interesting bit of industrial archaeology, tick. Just another town in just another place.
I am relieved to see the cyclist-oriented vending machine contains both Coke and Coke Zero Sugar. I may yet cycle in Belgium.
We have Schwalbe tyres so are unlikely to need the puncture repair kit. I can recommend cycling here as today’s geographical high point was about 20 metres. There are all sorts and conditions cycling here. One minute it’s all old ladies on sit up and begs and then hordes of wiry old gents on very slick carbon.