Friday, 13th April
After a better night’s sleep, using the gas heater to keep the chill away, we awoke to a very misty campsite. Thoughts of zooming up to the market and buying breakfast there were abandoned, and we had croissants and honey.
We did set off for the market, outside Netto as Dave (MandyAndDave) had helpfully informed us. Only it wasn’t outside Netto. We cycled on anyway, and headed for the town of Watten, and found … a market. It was only about half a mile further on. It was quite a small market by French standards, but interesting nonetheless. We bought a lettuce, BognorMike bought a tablecloth and some cheese, and we saw various other MotorhomeFacts members wandering around.
Although the mist had gone, the sun hadn’t quite appeared from behind the clouds, so we cycled through the town and out the other side. We were trying to head down to the river, and eventually found it next to the elevated SNCF track – which explains some of the “whooshing” noises we had been hearing in the past few days.
We began cycling down the towpath, admiring a lock with a huge elevated control tower, and a spiral staircase to access it. The only strange thing was that all of this expense was to control a change in levels of about two feet. I suppose needs must, and all that, but it still seemed a lot of effort to go to.
Our towpath route back to the campsite was blocked by the wharf to some industrial buildings, so we retraced our wheel tracks, and headed back through the lower edge of the town, and then back to the campsite, after stopping at Champion for some chocolate mask biscuits for our elevenses.
After lunch, Annie enjoyed a siesta in the van, and I checked to see how Oscar was faring (very nicely as it turned out), and had a number of chats up and down the field.
After tea, as the sun went down and the chill descended once more, Annie retired to the warmth of the van, and I bravely stayed outside, and presently Peter and Chris (Humber Traveller) appeared, and we had a lovely long chat.
