2015 Christmas Trip Day 2

Blissful to wake up in the van this morning and to have a shower in a warm bathroom.  What had been penitential in October was lovely in December!  Actually, it was lovely being able to read in bed last night without having to use a book light. The new lights are much better - I couldn't actually see to read with the old one. 

After breakfast I needed to stretch my legs, so walked up to the visitor centre, now sadly closed until April, across the canal, and down the other side to the bridge and so back to the van.

Lovely. Then fell asleep - Belgium is not the most beautiful of countries, especially on the motorway. We went past Courcelles, and I could only think of Walter Blythe, who was fictionally killed there. And on past  Aachen, where there was a bad hold-up. We thought this was at the border so refused the sat-nav's kind offer to take us a marginally quicker way, but in fact it turned out to be road works - the border between Belgium and Germany is as unremarkable as ever.

We arrived in Rodenkirch easily enough, although too early for Reception, so we had a late lunch and checked in once it had opened. Then, when we had parked up and plugged in the electricity, we set off to see what we could see.

Bus driver singularly unhelpful about buying tickets, but we worked out how in the end, and arrived at the tram station. Disaster! You needed to pay either with coins or with a contactless card, and we didn't have enough of the former, and foreign machines don't read British contactless cards.

So we came away, and decided to do a bit of shopping and to get plenty of change and try again tomorrow. We also walked back to the campsite, to save money - a very pleasant walk but my shoes weren't the best for walking and I was glad to get back to the van and enjoy a glass of wine while cooking supper. We are here for two nights, and as tomorrow is Sunday and the buses, as in the UK, are infrequent then, we will drive to the Park & Ride and get the tram from there. The Christmas Markets are all open on a Sunday; I expect they will be very crowded, but that is all part of the fun. Also, it is St Nicholas Day....