My birthday in France

Hello, and welcome to the second part of my September travelogue. 

For those of you who are new here, we've been spending a week in September in a cottage on the outskirts of Poperinge since our first visit back in 2012, when we fell in love with this picturesque part of Belgium, sandwiched between the French border and the North Sea coast.

Now, let me take you back to Thursday the 10th of September. In spite of the fact that the sun had once again taken centre stage, we got off to a very slow start that morning, eventually dragging ourselves out of bed when it was well on its way to 9 am. By the time we'd showered, got dressed and had a leisurely breakfast, the morning was well advanced, so that it would have been too late to go on an outing of any length before lunch.

So we decided to stay local and drive down to Poperinge, all of 10 minutes away by car.

We were, after all, on a mission! 

As Jos had gained a bit of weight courtesy of the cortisone-like medication he has been prescribed, he was no longer comfortable wearing a belt and had been toying with the idea of buying himself a pair of braces instead.

It so happens that for many a year we'd been admiring the display of braces in the window of a Poperinge shop, marvelling at their choice of fun designs. So, with that in mind, it goes without saying that no other shop would do!

We'd walked past the shop in question on our way to the Hop Museum on Wednesday, only to find that it was their closing day. Therefore our first port of call on that lazy Thursday morning was a no-brainer!

I'm sure you can imagine our disappointment at finding the shop closed once more. It was then that we saw the note pinned next to the one with the opening hours, proclaiming that they were closed for annual holidays. As they would be re-opening on Friday we had one final chance, even if it would disrupt our plans for that day.

Our consolation prize consisted in huge cups of cappuccino on the terrace of La Poupée, arguably the most popular of the establishments on Poperinge's Market Place.

This was followed by a quick visit to St-Bertinus church, Poperinge's main church and at the same time its oldest, the current building dating back to 1420. Here, we admired the  modern stained glass windows (1980) designed by Arno Brys (°1928). 

In honour of the upcoming hop festival, the church was decorated with hop bines, while carved wooden hop bells can be spotted in the church's rood screen.

After lunch and a short siesta back at the cottage, we decided to go for a short walk. Our destination of choice was the park beloning to De Lovie, a domain complete with Neoclassical castle, managed by a charitable organisation which supports children, young people and adults with mental disabilities.

Here another minor disappointment awaited as the castle turned out to be covered in scaffolding.

Not to be deterred, our little walk took us to the outskirts of the domain and the charming little garden called The Six Senses. On our way back, we rested our feet for a while inside a chapel dedicated to St. Theresa. 

Miss Sunshine decided to play hide-and-seek with the clouds on Friday, leaving us with a mostly grey and mizzly day. 

We'd made plans for the afternoon, but obviously we needed to continue with our mission of buying Jos a pair of braces from that shop in Poperinge first.

It was nothing short of a relief to finally find the shop open. After some dithering, Jos's choice fell on the green pair on the left. We later went back for the red pair on the right. Don't worry, you'll get to see him wearing the green pair shortly.

Our afternoon outing took us across the border into France for the first time that week. 

Only a 20-minute drive along country lanes from our cottage, our chosen destination was the Conservatoire Botanique National de Bailleul, a 25-hectare natural and educational site located in northern France, dedicated to the study and preservation of regional and European flora.

It might have been only a short drive but it was definitely a bumpy one, the final stretch being on a severely pot-holed lane. 

When, according to our Satnav, we were only a couple of minutes from our destination, we hadn't even clocked that we'd crossed the border! We were about to admit defeat and consider ourselves lost when I finally spotted a peeling sign half-hidden by an overgrown hedge. 

It started raining lightly the minute we stepped out of our car, so we grabbed our umbrellas and walked into the direction of the deserted ticket office. It turned out that the gardens were deserted as well: we had the 25-hectare site completely to ourselves!

The site contains two separate gardens, the smaller of the two being the Jardin des Plantes Médicinales (Medicinal Plant Garden), which showcases roughly 500 species of medicinal plants from across Europe.

The larger one, the Jardin des Plantes Sauvages (Wild Plant Garden) has around 1000 plant species across 64 themed plots and various reconstructed natural ecosystems, including dunes, chalk grasslands, meadows, heathland, peat bogs, and ponds.

Both had greatly suffered from the succession of heatwaves, but there was still more than enough of interest, although I wouldn't mind coming back here in Spring or early Summer.

The rain soon did a runner, making way for rays of glorious sunshine, which would accompany us into the evening.

Saturday the 12th of September was my birthday. My 65th birthday, to be exactly, so that I may officially consider myself an OAP. Well, on paper, that is. At the very least, it entitles me to a bus pass at a steeply reduced price :-)

Anyway, the weather gods treated me to a sunny day for my birthday!

I was determined to spend my birthday abroad, so we once again set off for the border, my choice of destination being Esquelbecq, a charming little town, or rather, village in French Flanders, about 20 kilometers from our cottage.

We had barely crossed the border into France when our plans were thwarted by a road closure due to a funfair. Unperturbed by it all, our Satnav proceeded to guide us along a succession of narrow lanes whose surfaces had seen better days, until we reached a main road with erratic speed limits, where we joined a long queue of traffic behind a slow-moving agricultural vehicle. It was nothing short of a miracle that we finally made it to at our destination and immediately found a free parking space on the main square opposite the church.

Esquelbecq is said to owe its name to the presence of its many oak trees. The name first appears in the 9th Century AD in the biography of St. Folquin, who  converted the local population to Christianity and died here in 855.

Presiding over the village's main square is the three-aisled hall church that bears its name - its oldest part dating back to the 10th Century - with its striking yellow and red trellis-like brickwork.

The tower houses a carillon with 13 bells, 12 of which date back to 1586.

The church was heavily damaged by a massive fire on Palm Sunday in 1976. It was painstakingly reconstructed in its traditional Flemish Gothic style and was finally reopened to the public on Christmas Eve in 1978.

Some charred pieces of liturgical furniture and religious statues survived the fire and can still be viewed inside the church today as a historical record of the event.

The ultimate aim of our journey was a visit to the 17th-century Flemish Renaissance water castle located in the centre of the village. As it would only open at 2 pm, we had a wander around the village and paid a visit to the church until our stomachs reminded us that it was time for lunch.

We were able to grab one of the last tables at La Régalade, a restaurant right next to and with a view of the castle. 

The gates opened at exactly 2 pm, by which time a small group of people was waiting impatiently, dying to explore the castle and its grounds.

Built around 1606–1610 on medieval foundations, the fairy tale-like castle features red brick styling, U-shaped wings enclosing an inner courtyard, round Gothic-style towers, wide moats fed by the River Yser, and a 17th-century dovecote. 

Although we didn't spot any doves, we were charmed by the free-roaming snow white peacocks which call the grounds their home. In fact, they are such a beloved feature of the castle that a white peacock feather serves at the castle's emblem. Some feathers were even for sale in the boutique selling home-grown produce and home-made jams, but as luck would have it, we found one for free in the grounds.

The castle originally had a medieval donjon or keep, which tragically collapsed during a storm  in September 1984.  The imposing 30-meter-tall donjon, featuring a spiral staircase with 126 steps, stood in the inner courtyard of the castle and had been added to and modified over the centuries, which ultimately affected the structure's stability.

The keep collapsed inward and outward, entirely obliterating itself while crushing almost half of the castle's North Wing. The impact destroyed the historical salons, valuable furnishings and centuries-old artwork, instantly making the castle unsafe and completely uninhabitable.

Following the disaster, the estate remained shuttered, neglected, and closed to the public for more than 30 years. It was officially registered as a historical monument in 1987 to protect what remained.

In the early 2000s, the Tamer-Morael family acquired the property and launched a multi-decade restoration effort. They rebuilt the destroyed North Wing, repaired the roofs and revitalized the unique gardens.

There are no plans to rebuild the iconic donjon, though.

The castle officially reopened its doors to the public in 2018 although apart from the garden and  grounds just a handful of rooms - most of them still unfinished - can be visited.

In the courtyard, a row of open windows are inviting a peek into the estate kitchens.

The 7-hectare estate includes formal Flemish Renaissance gardens, a kitchen garden, an orchard, and - according to the almighty Internet - a plant maze inspired by 17th-century models, which unfortunately we weren't aware of at the time of our visit.

There are topiaries and hedges, carefully trained and pruned pear and apple trees, and a lush and well-stocked vegetable garden. 

Taking centre stage in the garden since 2016 is a monumental sculpture titled L'Arrosoir d'Alice (Alice's Watering Can) by the French sculptor Philippe Thill.  

The sculpture stands about 4 meters tall and features a massive watering can complete with a large snail perched on its handle. Based, quite obviously, on Alice in Wonderland, the piece plays with scale to make visitors feel like tiny characters lost in an oversized garden.

It was late afternoon before we were finally able to tear ourselves away from this glorious garden. 

The journey back to our cottage wasn't without its hiccups, but that definitely didn't spoil this most perfect of days. 

Thank you for joining us on our travels!

Remember, remember: August and September

Hello there! I bet you weren't expecting another post from me so soon! But here I am, though not, as you might have presumed, with the second installment of my September travelogue. In order for my blog not to get too far behind the times, I thought I'd tell you all about the three weeks - from mid-August to the very beginning of September - which separated our UK holiday from our recent trip to Poperinge.

So, here goes!

After our sweaty return from our all too short UK holiday the previous day, we were thankful that the temperature had dropped to below 30°C on Saturday the 15th of August.

With the usual post-holiday chores like washing and stocking up at the supermarket on our to-do list, we had no choice but to come down to earth with a bump. Particularly since, the 15th being a public holiday in Belgium, only a handful of shops were open for business throughout the day and there were more than the usual queues in the ones which were.

I was wearing a birds and leaves patterned cotton skirt by Fever London found on a particularly lucky day at our most local charity shop in June 2025. Its companion was one of my charity shopped King Louie blouses. The belt was a high street buy between Lockdowns in 2020. The rest of my accessories were all second-hand finds, while my good old Clarks sandals were a Shropshire sales bargain in June 2018.

The rest of the day was spent giving some well-needed TLC to the garden - more about that later - and indulging Bess who claimed our laps, making up for lost time.

On Sunday the mercury only climbed to 25°C, which feels like the height of luxury now that we're on the slippery slope of Autumn, but quite the contrast which the heatwave temperatures we'd come down from. 

Being due back at the office on Monday, I was feeling more than just a bit maudlin. 

My skirt and blouse were another cotton combo, with the vintage, flower-sprinkled C&A skirt picked up from Think Twice just over two years ago, and the orange blouse with its birds and flowers print charity shopped back in 2021. Again, all accessories were second-hand finds, except for the green stretchy belt - a firm favourite - which came from Veritas, a high street haberdashery, hosiery and accessories shop.

On Monday, things turned out not to have been too hectic during my absence, so that I was able to catch up in no time. 

Nevertheless, the weather gods must have commiserated with me as it was a grey and rainy day, with the temperature a moderate 23°C.

Me and my assistant had just enough energy left for taking outfit photos after work, so this is what I was wearing.

I found the cotton, grooviliciously patterned skirt at Think Twice in August 2024, and it wasn't the first time I wore it with this red and white flower patterned King Louise blouse, charity shopped back in the mists of time. The belt with its multicoloured plastic buckle is yet another favourite stretchy one.

The week continued to be rainy, particularly on Wednesday, which was a total washout, with the temperature barely reaching 20°C.

No outfit photos were taken until Thursday, when this green and blue combo made it out of my wardrobe. The pleated green and white zig-zaggy maxi skirt - charity shopped back in June 2025 - wasn't the ideal choice for an office day, though, as the wheels of my chair kept trying to eat it.

The blouse, with its pandemonium of parrots (don't you just love that collective name?) is from the Belgian Sweet Soda label via the charity shops. I picked up the yellow in its pattern with my accessories. And look: I was wearing ankle boots, when less than a week before I was in sandals! 

My lunch break that day took me to the aforementioned Veritas, where I caught the tail end of the sales, finding these four belts for a total of just under € 15. Not that I needed any more belts, but I guess that I'm a belt-o-holic, to name just one of my many weaknesses ...

Friday 21st of August brought us a mix of clouds and sunny spells, again with highs of 23°C.

It was a day of catching up on chores as well as nipping over the road to feed our neighbours' cats Bobby, Billie and Pip while their servants were away for the weekend.

The red and white striped dress I was wearing was found during one of my rare visits to the local charity shop while Jos was unwell earlier this year; It's from H&M and this was its first outing but definitely not its last as it was such a joy to wear. A black stretchy belt from the high street and charity shopped necklace, ring and shoes, completed my outfit.

I also did some more tidying up in the garden, as some of our patio pots weren't in the best of shapes after having been left to their own devices while we were away. I'd grouped them together in the shady passageway and gave them a good watering before we left, but obviously that wasn't nearly enough to deal with those heatwave temperatures for days on end.

The rest of the garden seemed to have coped well, although our little pond needed topping up with well water. 

Apart from the Rudbeckia in its pot, I don't water the plants in the garden proper anyway, and I'm quite chuffed that I seem to have made the right choice when selecting plants after having to start from scratch back in June.

Meet our latest addition, Salvia microphylla 'Hot Lips', which we brought back from a trip to the garden centre that Sunday. We used to have this in exactly the same spot but lost it during the Big Neglect.

Together with the masses of magenta flowers of  Phlox 'Sweet Summer Wine' - one of our rare survivors - it is still providing a splash of colour to this corner of our garden as I type.

When Jos recently showed some photos of our garden to the guys who'd razed it to the ground back in June, they actually did a double-take, hardly able to believe their eyes at what we'd achieved in only a couple of months' time.

With the mercury flitting around 20°C and the odd mizzly rain stirred into the mix of sunshine and clouds, it was starting to feel somewhat autumnal at times. 

Not sure if this was why I seemed to be drawn to autumnal colours in my outfits, or if it was just a question of these being my favourite shades and those I think suit me best. 

The swirly brown and white skirt was this Summer's sales bargain from Mango, while the charity shopped bird patterned blouse with its frilly collar and cuffs has been gracing my wardrobe for many years. Again, the tiny pops of yellow in the blouse's pattern dictated my choice of accessories.

It's only now that I'm writing this post that it dawns on me how many bird-patterned garments I've worn. And this one wasn't even the last one ...

I'm skipping a week as not only didn't I summon the energy to take photos after work, it seems that I didn't make a single entry in my journal either.

Friday the 28th started with appointment at eye clinic to monitor the low tension glaucoma in my left eye. Thankfully, things seem to be under control or at least haven't got any worse. This was followed by drinks and a catch-up with my friend Inez in the afternoon.

The slightly under par weather remained the same, so, with the temperature still not venturing any higher than the low twenties, this is what I wore. Another pairing of birds and autumn shades for this charity shopped dress by Belgian high street label JBC. There's some greyish green in the print, which I picked up with my accessories. The colour of the dress was echoed with my ankle boots.

While I was rummaging through a drawer of blouses a couple of days later, I came across this one with exactly the same pattern as the dress, which I'd completely forgotten about. It was charity shopped in Poperinge a couple of Septembers ago. 

Still the same weather in the month's final weekend, which was spent tackling a mix of chores, doing the supermarket run and making a trip to the garden centre where I succumbed to two more additions for our garden: Penstemon 'White Bedder' and Nepeta 'Six Hills Giant'.

A rich burnt orange was the main ingredient for Saturday's outfit, featuring a flouncy burnt orange skirt sprinkled with navy squiggles. A charity shop find in October 2023, it's from the Danish Soft Rebels label. Another Danish label, Vero Moda, supplied the floral blouse, which was part of a charity shop haul in August 2022.

 

Originally from Belgian high street chain LolaLiza, I charity shopped the maxi dress I wore on Sunday  almost exactly one year ago to the day. 

My accessories were all of the blush pink variety and once again, my feet were once again kept happy in my burgundy ankle boots.

As always before a holiday, things were a whirlwind of preparations at the office, so that my one and only colleague wouldn't be swamped with work while I was away.

I still had time to walk to a charity shop called Kringwinkel and the Oxfam boutique, both situated in a street just a couple of minutes from my office. It's an up and coming trendy street where my hairdresser used to be. It also houses the lovely Katshop, and a recently opened English bookshop.

My mission was to buy a couple of shirts for Jos. Mission accomplished, I had a rummage for myself, finding two King Louie dresses and a skirt by Sugarhill, Brighton. 

Friday the 4th of September was spent making a start with my holiday packing, as we would be leaving to Poperinge on Sunday. With the weather gods seemingly being up to no good, it wasn't a question of chucking a handful of heatwave proof things into my suitcase, as I had to make sure to cater for all kinds of weather.

I was wearing a mix of new and new-to me, featuring a fruitalicious skirt by the German Basler label and paired with an orange short-sleeved thin knit jumper and accessories in yellow and green. Oh, and those ankle boots again. They're currently my most comfortable pair.

With the temperature a gentle 23°C, we sat out in the garden between packing. For a while now, we had been getting a visitor at around 9 pm each evening. It was quite uncanny how much he or she looked like Bess's predecessor, Phoebe.  

I'm ending this post with the outfit I wore on Saturday the 5th of September. It was almost a carbon copy of one I wore back in June, even down to the belt. My necklace and shoes were different, though.

But the biggest difference is that I added this fabulous embroidered felt waistcoat on top. A lucky find for only a couple of € at Think Twice back in December, this was its first proper outing. 

So, that was it for now. I promise to be back with that long overdue second installment of my travelogue soon.

Hops, towers and biscuits

It was Sunday the 6th of September when sunshine accompanied us on our by now familiar way to Poperinge, where our holiday cottage, Marjolein Guesthouse, was waiting for us once more. 

Including our stopover on our way to the UK back in August, this would be our third visit this year. Still, our hearts were making jumps of joy the minute we drove through our very own ornamental wrought iron gates. The view from our balcony never fails to delight us either: we were looking forward to sitting and staring across the lake and fields towards the Franco-Flemish hills for the next week.

I promise not to bore you to death waxing lyrical about the cottage which has been a true home away from home for more than 15 years, but here's the view of the compact little studio from one end to the other. The bathroom is hidden away behind the glazed door in front of the bed, and there's a breakfast nook offering an ever-enchanting view across the lake next to the kitchen block.

The weather forecast for the week ahead was for slightly cooler temperatures of just under 20°C, but thankfully no rain (ha!), but for now we were enjoying mild mid-twenties summer highs.

Having arrived shortly after 3 pm we had no further plans for the day than making ourselves at home and having a catch-up with our lovely host and friend Marino, who insisted on taking our photo.

We were one week later than usual so that I would be able to celebrate my birthday away from home. Therefore, we were fully expecting the hop field across the road to be partly harvested by now. Turned out that for once they weren't keeping to their usual schedule. As a result of the succession of heatwaves, hop picking began about a week later than usual, with the harvest estimated to be 20 per cent lower due to the flowers having been been scorched by the heat.

I hopped across the road to have a closer look at the rows of hop poles, at that time having absolutely no idea that we would be able to have an even closer look a couple of days later ...

Sunshine and clouds were playing a game of tag on Monday morning, but with the mercury still climbing to a balmy 23°C there was absolutely no reason to complain.

After a leisurely breakfast followed by the arduous task of pulling on Jos's compression socks, the first item on our agenda was stocking up on food and drink at the local supermarket.

Having dropped everything off at the cottage, we then decided on our first outing of our holiday, for which we selected Lijssenthoek Military Cemetery. Although involving a drive of less than 10 minutes from the cottage, we still managed to get hopelessly lost, as our Satnav insisted on taking us to the hamlet named Lijssenthoek instead of to the cemetery. 

Lijssenthoek Military Cemetery was designed by Sir Reginald Blomfield and is the second largest Commonwealth cemetery in Belgium, the largest being Tyne Cot Cemetery near Zonnebeke, about 25 kilometers away.

From 1915 until 1920 the hamlet of Lijssenthoek became the venue for the biggest evacuation hospital in the Ypres Salient. During the First World War, the hamlet was situated on the main communication line between the Allied military bases in the rear and the Ypres battlefields. Close to the Front, but out of the extreme range of most German field artillery, it became a natural place to establish casualty clearing stations. 

The cemetery contains 9901 Commonwealth burials of the First World War, 24 being unidentified. There are 883 war graves of other nationalities, mostly French and German, 11 of these unidentified.

One cannot help to be moved by those endless rows of identical headstones, bittersweet reminders of the atrocities and pointlessness of war.

In a reflective mood, we drove back to our cottage for lunch followed by forty winks (Jos) and a date with my current read.  

As I sat watching the antics of the plump of moorhens which call the lake their home, I suddenly spotted the majestic blue heron who sat patiently waiting for his next meal to swim along. It was only after I'd grabbed my camera that I saw I wasn't the only one who'd spotted him! 

Clouds started gathering in the afternoon, but although the darkening sky held a promise of rain, it would remain dry for the rest of the day. The overall gloom wasn't inviting us to leave the cozy confines of our cottage. However, I'd promised my colleague to pay a visit to a little chapel called Ons Heerens Boompje, which literally translates as Our Lord's little tree.

Although it's within walking distance from our cottage - a walk we did a couple of times over the years - we decided to drive part of the way, along a bumpy unsurfaced road, and park on the chapel's tiny car park in the middle of the fields. The eagle-eyed among you might spot our car in the far distance in the photo on the top left. On the bottom right, across the fields, one can spot the stand of poplar trees belonging to the domain surrounding our cottage.

From the car park, it's another 100 metres or so through the fields, until a narrow gravel path running along a hedge veers off to the left. At the end of this, the little chapel is waiting, sheltered by the black poplar which is the last so-called "fetish tree" in West Flanders, legend of which goes back 400 years. 

The hawthorn hedge surrounding the chapel is hung with ribbons of fabric, and indeed whole garments of any shape and size, since legend has it that this would make fever, pain and ailments go away.

My colleague asked me to hang up a pair of socks belonging to her Mum and, while we were there, we also added a handkerchief belonging to Jos, burning a votive candle for good measure.

Before retiring inside for the rest of the day, me and my assistant made some photos of my outfit, featuring my chocolate brown polka-dot maxi skirt from C&A and charity shopped zig-zag patterned t-shirt, last worn together in July.

A granite grey sky greeted us when we drew back the curtains on Tuesday. Fortunately, the clouds seemed to be holding their breaths for now, apparently not wishing to disrupt our plans for that morning.

On Monday evening, Jos's daughter An had messaged us, telling us she'd read that a new viewpoint had been opened in Poperinge that very day: a 6-metre high metal tower looking out over the hop fields belonging to hop farm Belhop.

Having holidayed here so many times, I was familiar with the name Belhop. What's more, we could actually see a corner of one of their hop fields from our balcony. In fact, if we leaned slightly over our balcony's railing, we were able to spot the tower half-hidden by some trees.

Despite it being only a hop, skip and a jump away, we took the car and parked on the premises of the farm, after which we proceeded to climb the tower for a bird's eye view of the hop field. 

And look what we spotted through one of the viewers mounted on top of the tower! It's the little chapel we visited on Monday!

Mission accomplished, we drove to Poperinge for a rummage at the local charity shop, the first drops of mizzly rain starting to fall when we stepped out of our car.

Contrary to their colleagues the weather gods, the gods of the charity shops were on their best behaviour that day and gifted me this fabulous needlecord maxi dress. I also found a retro-style blouse, which I promise to style for you soon.

We were back at our cottage for lunch when the rain started coming down in earnest. 

As according to our weather app it would rain for the rest of the afternoon, we needed to find an indoor activity. Having exhausted almost all rainy weather options over the years, it was almost a given that it would be something we'd done before. 

Our destination of choice: the Jules Destrooper Visitors Centre in Lo-Reninge, which is Belgium's smallest city but one, having gained city rights as recent as 1985.

In different rooms, the rich history of the family business and the art of biscuit making in general is laid out, followed by the serious business of biscuit tasting at the end.

We were debating whether to buy the biscuit patterned umbrella but ultimately decided against it. We soon realized the error of our ways when we stepped back outside ...

The rain clouds eventually departed elsewhere that evening, making way for some golden sunlight to end the day with.

The sun was up bright and early again on Wednesday morning, although there was a strong wind that kept the temperature firmly in check just under 20°C.

Another day, another tower to climb!

We'd driven by this tower sitting forlornly in a field for many years, wondering about its purpose. Finally, all became clear last year, although we still hadn't managed to visit.

The so-called German tower from the Second World War was restored and opened to the public in May 2025, exactly 80 years after the end of the war. 

It is one of the few remaining visible traces of the air war in Poperinge during the Second World War. The 13-metre-high tower was built by the Germans as an observation tower for Flugplatz Peselhoek, a 125-hectare airfield that was never used.

See-through metal steps - not exactly my thing as I suffer from vertigo - climb up to a viewing platform at the top. Thankfully there are stops at every floor, where rooms with solid floors offer information on the history of the tower.

In 1942, the site was converted into a vegetable garden to provide food supplies, while during the Cold War, the Belgian army used the tower as an observation post for the Air Defence Service. 

The views from the top were magnificent, even if they were accompanied by a soundtrack conducted by a stormy wind.

Our stomachs were in need of sustenance by the time we were back on solid ground, so our next stop was Poperinge's town centre, where we managed to grab a table at restaurant Goeste.

The afternoon was spent visiting the Hop Museum in Poperinge, which is housed in the former municipal hop warehouses. It is the only museum in Belgium devoted entirely to the cultivation and culture of hops, offering four floors of local hop-growing history and Belgian beer culture.

Poperinge has been the centre of Belgian hop production for centuries, and the town has been hosting a three-yearly hop festival in September, a tradition started exactly 70 years ago, in 1956. This year's edition would be the 26th, and would take place from 18 until 20 September.

Preparations were already in full swing ...

Back at the cottage, there was a very fitting end to this "hoppy" day, as much to our delight hop picking had started in the field across the road!

I hope you enjoyed tagging along with me? I promise to be back with part 2, including my birthday shenanigans, soon.