Back in Belgium

Our ten day UK trip flew by, partly due to the grueling schedule (sorry pumpkin) but mostly because we had a great time. I don’t know why people insist on enduring hours of traffic to get to the South of France when England is just a breezy boat trip away. And contrary to common beliefs, the sun actually shines there as well; I even got a slight tan.


I’m happy to say that we did 95% of everything I planned on doing and I was really blown away by this country’s wide open spaces and quaint little villages, even more so that I expected. And apparently driving on the left isn’t that bad or so my driver tells me.


A little recap: Rye (small, fortified and scrumptious), Beachy Head (white cliffs, windy, amazing), Brighton (lovely independent shops, infamous pier, Taj Mahal-like pavilion), Winchester (rain, Jane Austen’s grave, missed the Round Table), Stonehenge (small, expensive, too many tourists and lots of magpies), Salisbury (huge cathedral, lovely town, pick nick), Bournemouth (sandy beach, great park, live music), Cerne Abbas (chalk giant, beautiful village, stunning abbey), Dorchester (Thomas Hardy, cream tea, lots of wasps), Chesil beach (windy, impressive length, hard), Torquay (aka the English Riviera, lovely marina, Agatha Christie, beautiful location and B&B), Fowey (quaint, gorgeous cove, spectacular views),


Eden Project (cool concept, hot, bought a venus flytrap), Penzance (room with a sea view, saw the St. Michael’s Mount, very tired), St. Ives (tiny hilly town, Tate St. Ives, fantastic shops, beaches, views = perfection), Dartmoor National Park (wild dartmoor ponies, nature as far as the eye can see, fairytale-like villages), Glastonbury (abundance of spiritual shops, King Arthur’s grave, breathtaking abbey and cute ducklings), Cheddar Gorge (rip off), Bath (absolutely beautiful town, peaceful, so many shops), Bristol (didn’t leave hotel), Vale of the white horse (chalk horse on hill, green and exhausting), Buckland


(granddad’s birthplace, quiet, quaint, cozy), Oxford (lots of bookshops, infamous Norrington room at Blackwells, majestic buildings), Windsor (Windsor Castle, Eton college and The Book Depository!), London (Hampstead Heath: spectacular views of the city and a lovely walk, Highgate cemetery: dramatic, haunting, Douglas Adams and George Elliot) and Canterbury finally (cathedral, lots of shopping and it felt like coming home because we'd already been there so many times).


My favorite spots however, were without a doubt St. Ives, Bath, Fowey, Dartmoor National Park and Rye, if the previous recap wasn't that clear.

There are also ten things I learned the past ten days:

• Travelling in the UK takes longer. The only decent motorway doesn’t pass along the coastline so don’t count on driving more than an average of 50 kilometers an hour.
• I truly loath baths! They are uncomfortable, unpractical and take too long to fill up.
• The sat nav in our new car apparently doesn’t always know the crucial difference between left and right plus she can’t pronounce the word one in Dutch which gets me every time.
• I now know why the English put milk in their tea, without it, it’s a recipe for heartburn. I’m talking from experience here.
• I love nature, or driving through it at least.
• Cream teas (pot of tea with some delicious scones, clotted cream and strawberry jam) rock!
• Even the smallest town has at least one bookstore, proving once again that the UK is my kind of country.
• When I do finally grow up I want to live in a Cotswold cottage, seriously.
• Belgium desperately needs a Marks & Spencer! Life would be so much easier.
• And finally, my new favorite word is shrubbery.

On a different note, whenever I go to England I always return with at least three books thanks to Waterstones perpetual 3 for 2 offer and this time was no different:

• The Help by Kathryn Stockett, one of the most hyped novels of the summer
• On Chesil Beach by Ian McEwan which I wanted to read after actually being on Chesil Beach
• The Wasp Factory by Iain Banks, a dark and twisted cult classic

What I didn’t count on however, was stumbling across the 2£ bookshop in Oxford where I adopted:

• The Adventuress by Audrey Niffenegger, a gorgeous “novel in pictures”
• Wetlands by Charlotte Roche, a girl and her vagina which took everyone by surprise last year
• The winner stands alone by Paulo Coelho, Coelho’s first attempt at the thriller genre
• The art of racing in the rain by Garth Stein, drama and a talking dog for just 2£

I also bought Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts, a colossal novel that has been getting rave reviews for months now (3£ at Waterstones due to a small crease) and The Hairy Bikers Food Tour of Britain which was half price and a scrumptious reminder of their wonderful show.


What more can I say? There were some absolutely gorgeous towns, endless stretches of nature, exciting rocky roads, an amazing (cultural) heritage, sandy and stony beaches, lovely regional dishes and finally lots and lots of shops. What more could you ask for really, besides a little more time? But this trip was just an initiation to see which regions are begging for some further exploration over the next couple of years because one thing’s for sure, we'll be back!