June 23 Bruchem to Dilsen-Stokkem
We slept in… longer than ever… Birds woke us up at about 4, but we put in earplugs and fell back to sleep. I slept until 8:30. It was amazing. The bed was really comfortable and there were 4 windows open and a fan. The temperature was perfect. We loved B&B De Bloesemgof. Highly recommend it, especially if you need a place that also can securely store your bike.
No Alpine start for us. We didn’t roll until after 9:30. We rode a few miles and found a place with smoothies and fruit - our standard breakfast.
When we finished eating and got ready to leave it started raining, so we put on our coats and that made it stop.
After a little less then 2 hours we stopped at a farmers market in Saint-Michelsgestel and bought fruit and veggies for lunch.
We then rode through Eindhoven, Achel, and Bocholt. We are staying in Dilsen-Stokken in the House Max B&B. The hosts are super nice - the husband even offered a ride to a restaurant, which our tired bodies gratefully accepted.
Today’s ride was mostly on beautiful bike paths. Some of the route had us next to large canals with barges and other boats. The few roads we had to use seemed to give bikes high priority. The drivers seem extra courteous.
The highlight of the day for me was finding a place that served popsicles. Seriously, popsicles straight from heaven.
Our ride was a little over 100 km and involved about 500 turns (there are so many paths - and our routing software tends to offer zig zag routes through the larger cities.) Amazingly we only took 2 or 3 wrong turns which we quickly recovered from. I have no idea how people did this without phones and bike computers with GPS.
Dinner was nice. Another salad for Natalie and veggie spaghetti for me.
Everyone has been nice to help us with our complete lack of Dutch language skills. Although we confuse them when we say we don’t want cheese or meat. Crazy Americans.
