After picking up our last belongings at my mom's, and a party at friends', we officially left on our trip through Europe. Literally, just across the border in Germany, in the little town of Rees, we stopped for lunch. It turned out to be such a cool place, full of fun art!
We had lunch in Germany, but we spent the next two nights in the most southern province of The Netherlands, Zuid Limburg. It is our only hilly area... a third of our country is below sea level and everywhere else it is flat.
The campsite in Vijlen had a beautiful view. The cows were herded back to the barn by dogs at night.
The three-border-region was a place we could not miss. We found out that there are about 176 international tripoints in the world, but somehow this one is special to us.
Myron joked we left him all alone in Belgium, while I was in Germany and Raija in The Netherlands, with John taking the picture ;)
Ladies and gentlemen, may we present the highest point of The Netherlands! A whooping 322.5 meter above sea level!
(For everyone in BC, Burnaby Mountain is already higher...)
We spent the next few days in the Mullerthal region, in Luxembourgh. Starting from our camping in Consdorf, we could hike the most amazing trails. The first day we hiked a trail famous for its crevasses and rock formations.
The second day we hiked to the Schiessentümpel, a famous bridge and waterfall.
We thoroughly enjoyed the hikes and especially the lush green forest we walked through. We forgot how many shades of green there are!
The first night in France we spent in Val-de-Vesle, near Rheims.
In the morning, we spent a long time at a police station. No, nothing alarming, we just had a question.
To be able to drive in big cities in France, you need a Crit'Air sticker, an air quality certificate. The super friendly policeman that helped us, told us you can only get one by ordering it online (we knew that). But since we have no address in Europe to send it to, we discussed the possibility to send it to a campsite we intend to stay at later. After a long chat (hurray for Google Translate) he offered to help us out, so we would have a printout of the receipt, and I went to his office with him and we sat down at a computer to get our info entered... First question: Country of Registration of your car.... No option for Canada! After everything we had discussed, we could not even get one for our car. The policeman agreed we tried everything and we will explain to the first cop pulling us over (for not having the €4.- sticker) that there was no option for us to order one.
Last night we spent in Soissons, France. It is one of the most ancient towns in France, with the ruins of the Abbey of St Jean des Vignes as one of its landmarks. The abbey was founded in 1076 and most buildings were built in the 12th to16th century. Such an amazing place to be!
Today we drove straight into Paris! John loves driving in hectic places and two rounds around the Arc de Thriomphe was just what he needed ;)
In his words: "This is what I live for!"
To top off our drive to the campsite we drove past the Eiffel tower.
We will spend the next few days in Paris and we cannot wait to start exploring!
Paris, here we come!
Have a wonderful adventure, it looks super awesome right away! I will copy the tips in case we one day go on a camping holiday in Europe - even for a month. Greetings from Finland, if at some point you come here, it would be nice to meet and spend time together.
I'm drooling with jealousy. This is great and thank you for sharing your adventure. (I'll probably say that a lot). The forest looks gorgeous and peaceful.
Loved the family inserted into the sculpture pics!
Happy Mother’s Day! I am enjoying coming along on this trip with you all. So amazing. Thanks for the pictures 💖 Donna and Charlie
I love that Myron is sporting his Sail MB shirt! Another fantastic read! Enjoy your time in Paris!