New adventures in the west

Hello, and welcome back to this year's September travelogue. 

Having been rudely interrupted by an August outfit catch-up which didn't exactly go as planned, my blogging mojo had temporarily deserted me. I'm grateful to the Blogger Team for taking my feedback seriously and removing the unjustified warning for sensitive content. 

So, back to the first week of September it is!

We woke up to a sunny but again quite windy morning on Tuesday the 2nd of September. 

The forecast was for highs of just 19°C with a high chance of rain in the afternoon.

After a botched attempt at fried eggs for breakfast (don't ask!), we were ready for another day of adventures. 

A leisurely 35 minute drive from our cottage, our chosen destination was border town Wervik. 

With the combined attractions of a nature reserve and a museum, it's astonishing that we've never visited the town before in the 14 years that we've been holidaying in this part of Belgium.

Wervik is one of the oldest towns in Belgium, going back to the Romans, who called it Viroviacum.

During the First World War, the town was occupied by the German Army for four years. Wervik was for the Germans what Poperinge was for the British: a place to rest, behind the lines.

However, the town's greatest claim to fame lies in a very different direction: tobacco! 

Once Belgium's main tobacco-growing region, today only a handful of tobacco fields remain.

Happily, the story of the industry's past has been preserved in the National Tobacco Museum, which was part of our reason for visiting the town. The museum has been housed in the annexes of an 18th-century windmill called the Briekenmolen - which you can see in the first collage - since 1987. A new, modern wing was added in 2003.

Wervik has had a long tradition as a tobacco-growing region. In fact, tobacco has been cultivated here since around 1650. 

The industry experienced a boom in the 18th century. As France levied very high excise duties on tobacco, the town's situation near the border made it the perfect operating base for smugglers!

Today, over 98% of Belgian tobacco is still produced here, but its heyday has definitely come to an end as tobacco cultivation is no longer profitable, particularly due to the gradual reduction in EC subsidies given to Belgian tobacco farmers.

Apart from the history of tobacco, and how it conquered the world, the museum also charts the history of smoking as well as other, forgotten forms of tobacco use.

The advert on the top left actually encourages young men to start smoking a pipe as it was beneficial for both one's heart and one's purse strings. How times have changed!

There's also a reconstruction of a tobacconist’s shop from the 1920s and a very covetable collection of advertising signs from a bygone age.

Although both non-smokers - Jos has never smoked in his life and I quit nearly 30 years ago - we found the museum interesting and endlessly fascinating.

It was well past midday by the time we'd finished our tour, so the on-site retro café, In den Grooten Moriaen, was beckoning us with its lunch menu and extensive choice of non-alcoholic beers. We would return to this delightful café, which was clearly frequented by tourists and locals alike, for a shared waffle and our customary cappuccinos in the afternoon.

The sun was still shining in a patchy blue sky when we made our way to the back of the museum towards the footbridge leading into nature reserve De Balokken.

The straightening of a bend in the River Lys (Leie in Flemish) in 1990 resulted in the formation of a 36-hectare island which is nestled between two arms of the river. It was laid out as a varied landscape park with footpaths and a boardwalk through a marshy area.

France lies on the other side of the river and, in fact, a small part of the island is French territory. 

I'd downloaded a walk from the town's tourist website, which would take us into France after crossing the little footbridge you can see on the centre right in the below collage. According to the walk's instructions, we would then be able to walk along the river's towpath on the French side and return to Belgium via the main bridge a little further on.

The instructions, however, turned out to be outdated as, crossing the footbridge, we had no choice but to keep walking along a path which was fenced off on both sides, until we reached the outskirts of the French village called Wervicq-Sud.

Neither the village nor the rapidly darkening sky were appealing to us, so that we decided to return to the island and, ultimately, to the cozy café for the aforementioned waffle and cappuccinos.

But not before admiring some local artwork (above, centre left and bottom right). And my outfit, of course: I was wearing my linen blend embroidered Zara skirt again, this time combined with a charity shopped yellow patterned long-sleeved t-shirt and my denim jacket from Think Twice.

It finally started raining while we were driving back to the cottage and apparently we couldn't get away fast enough as we received a speeding ticket about two weeks later! Oh well ...

On Wednesday the 3rd, the weather that greeted us as we opened our curtains was a bit of a letdown. The blustery wind and granite grey sky weren't exactly spurring us into action, so that we stayed in bed a bit longer until we'd decided on our plans for the day.

After eggs and soldiers for breakfast, we drove to Ypres, about twenty minutes up the road from our holiday home. Unlike last year, finding a parking spot was a doddle, as we left our car in the edge of town car park we'd ultimately stumbled upon last year.

It was still dry by then, and we were even treated to a couple of short-lived sunny spells. Still, we decided to walk to the town centre the direct way instead of taking the 2,6 kilometer ramparts walk.

Our first port of call was St. George's Memorial Church. The church was designed by architect Sir Reginald Blomfield and built to commemorate the over 500,000 British and Commonwealth troops who died in the three battles fought for the Ypres Salient during the Great War. It was completed in 1929.

Walking through the Kloosterpoort (Cloister Gate) across the square, the stone garden of the Lapidarium is reached. Lying in the shadow of St. Martin's Cathedral, it contains the older ruins of St. Martin’s monastery and cloisters. One of the few remaining ruins in the town centre, the Lapidarium is a permanent reminder of the destruction caused by the First World War.

The Cloister Gate (above, top left), which dates from about 1780, was one of the few structures which was not completely demolished by the end of the war. It was still standing while almost everything around it was reduced to piles of rubble.

It had started drizzling by now so, still a tiny bit too early for lunch, we took refuge inside St. Martin's Cathedral, whose entrance lies around the corner from the Lapidarium.

No matter how many times we've visited, we can't help but being impressed by it sumptuous and lofty interior. It's rather mind-boggling that the cathedral, which like most of the brave city of Ypres was in ruins after the war, was actually completely rebuilt in the 20th Century!

Lunch was had at a brasserie called In het Kleine Stadhuis, which is tucked into the corner of the main square, next to the Cloth Hall. 

It had started raining in earnest while we were waiting for the bill, but had virtually stopped by the time we were back outside. Not for long though. In fact, it would be raining on and off for the rest of the afternoon.

Thankfully we'd come armed with our umbrellas - mine a poppy one I'd actually bought here in Ypres back in 2017 - so out they came. 

The Menin Street - which leads towards the impressive Menin Gate - was suitably decorated with garlands of filigree umbrellas.

The largest memorial to the First World War, the Menin Gate is the spot where the Last Post has been sounded every evening at 8 o’clock since 1928.

This memorial, which is in the form of a Roman triumphal arch, and was designed - again - by Sir Reginald Blomfield, displays the names of 54,896 soldiers of the then British Empire who went missing in action. It lists the names from the beginning of the war until 15 August 1917.

One cannot be but moved by those interminable lists of names carved into the stone of the walls and the surrounding loggias.

After a two-year restoration project designed to bring the monument back to its best in time for its centenary in 2027, the Menin Gate was re-opened to the public earlier this year. It now has a living roof’ with vegetation planted on top as part of a new waterproofing system.

In spite of the stormy weather conditions, we decided to walk back to the car park the long way, via the delightful ramparts walk, which can be accessed from the Menin Gate.

The sign in the centre of the collage made me smile. For my non-Dutch speaking readers, the word Ergens translates as Somewhere ... 

The somewhere we were going to was back to our cottage!

I'll be back with further adventures soon.