We left the Ibis Budget hotel at 7:30am in the hope that we would avoid morning rush hour traffic. However, as we were getting used to driving in another country, our concentration was not at 100% on our first morning in Europe. This meant, Ravi went down the wrong road, Ajay tried to go round a roundabout the wrong way and managed to get caught up in traffic lights. 20 mins later he managed to catch up with us as we headed out of Lille and onto the A26 motorway.
We went through a police checkpoint into Belgium and Ajay became nervous about his number plate still not being attached to his car. Although he didn’t get stopped, he was worried that his luck would run out soon and so he wanted to get his plate re-attached.
We stopped in a town called Soignies in Belgium and parked in the town center next to the cathedral. As we left Lille without breakfast, we decided to have breakfast in Soignies. Ajay looked for double sided tape at a hardware shop called Quincaillerie Michel. It was fascinating watching Ajay struggle trying to communicate the word “tape” to someone who doesn’t speak english. The miming wasn’t working very well. Eventually he bought something, but whilst he was attempting to fix his plate on I told him I had Gorilla tape (extra strong duct tape) he could use. So he ended up just using Gorilla tape instead.
We then spent a bit of time exploring the town whilst Ravi went missing looking for a toilet. Me and Ajay found a really cool sweet shop and tea room called Le Monde de Rosy. I decided not to buy sweets because I wanted to keep my energy level constant and not have energy peaks and dips which would affect my concentration when driving, but I was very tempted. After topping up the snack supplies at the local supermarket, especially drinks we headed back onto the motorway.
Ravi suddenly called out over the radio whilst we were driving,
“Did that hit your car?”
“What?”, came my response. “The debris” he said. Suddenly, I noticed that the action camera Ajay had fixed to the the back of my car had flown off and smashed into bits on the motorway. Turns out the mounting joint wasn’t very good. From then on, all uses of the action camera had Gorilla tape added for extra strength.
After a fairly uneventful motorway drive which Ajay and Ravi decided to liven up with their exhausts at every tunnel, we eventually arrived at the hotel. Ajay booked us into the Hôtel-Restaurant Chez Anna et Jean which was a no frills small hotel but was able to sleep 3 without the use of a bunk bed or sofa bed.
We arrived at 2:30 and decided to get onto the bus which stopped outside the hotel and explore Luxembourg City. We walked around the city and admired the central park which was in a gorge that ran through the city. Ajay managed to find a Scottish bar on the banks of the Alzette which was the only place he could get blackcurrant cordial (Ribena to the rest of us).
As the sun was setting, we decided to look for dinner. The others were being quite picky so I just got chips from a takeaway and sat on the steps in a square watching a local brass band play. We then headed back to the hotel to get an early start on the next day
The distance traveled during the day was approximately 194 miles which took us around 5 hours to complete.
Watch the short video which includes day 1 and 2. Stay tuned for day 3 when we go to Germany and disaster strikes on the Autobahn.
Tabish
Long Way There 