Before writing today I have had to go back and see what I wrote yesterday. My mind is in turmoil trying to decide what to do – but I think I am still in agreement with what I wrote yesterday.

I’m staying in the Tir Nan Og Stables B&B in a small bungalow attached to the house and I’m going to stay for a second night so I can do some tourism. It is a little oasis of green with birds singing, chickens running around and the dog guarding my from door.

 The breakfast was amazing, I couldn’t eat everything – upon reflection I should have made sandwiches, I’ll do that tomorrow. Over breakfast I plotted a nice 70km route to see a couple of things on my to do map. I keep a QGIS map where when I see, or hear about, something interesting I put a point on the map.

Today was to see firstly “Fietsen door de Bomen”, which translates to “Cycling through the Trees”. It was only a short ride to it, over drying paths as it had been raining. I delayed my departure and headed out with only a small load. After the business of Sunday, the cycle paths were much quieter. The cycle path in the Trees is a circular architectural structure that in a ramp and concentric path that takes you up to 6 or 7 metres high into the trees, around a maybe 100 metre diameter circle before leading back down to ground level. I really liked it and went around twice. It was great to have it to myself, on a drizzling Monday morning, and I expect it would be a different story on a sunny Sunday.

I headed to my next stop, initially through beautiful forests with bike paths in all directions.

I had quite a way to go and soon got onto a series of long dead straight, very busy roads – all with marked cycle lanes. It is noisy but a good way to quickly get from A to B by bike. There are lots of e-bikes, and its hard to tell them from the traditional Dutch bikes – except I can’t catch my them. On these busier roads I’ve noticed a different breed of e-bike, and these really fly. They have number plates, the riders wear helmets closer to motorcycle helmets (well have a visor) and the riders still pedal, but they must be doing 40 km/h or more – on the cycle lanes. There are also mopeds on the cycle lanes, but these seem to be youngsters and generally not going much faster than cyclists. I don’t think I’ve seen any “illegal e-bikes”, or rather “electric motorbikes”. They have e-scooters in towns but because of the cycleways these are well ordered (although I did have a couple wobble through gaps a bicycle wouldn’t have tried). My overall impression of Belgium is that people obey the laws (or have the law), to make travelling on the roads a pleasure for all. Pedestrians and cyclists wait for the green man/bike (I think jaywalking may be illegal), cars do the same. In towns, cars give way to bikes and pedestrians keep off the roads and cycleways. It just works.

The sight I was heading for was “Cycling through the Water”. A narrow path straight through the middle of a lake so you end up Cycling at eye level with the water. Good fun to cycle through, but it was even better to watch others. Their heads travelling along the water, and gradually rising out the otherside.

Going back wasn’t so nice, as it started to rain and I got another puncture. I executed a better first time repair this time, but it did turn into a slow puncture needing a top up every 10km or so.

I passed a sign for Speedway, which is pretty rare sport in this part of the world (Belgium, Netherlands and France) but a bit more common in Germany. If I had thought to look at my other QGIS map showing all the speedway tracks I would have known it was only a 2km diversion to Heusden Zolder speedway, to have a look at it.

I stopped for a late lunch and then popped into Lidl to by some dinner. The room had a microwave so was looking a ready meals but couldn’t find any. In the UK we have freezers full of them, all I found was a high protein vegetable dish which would have to do. The whole clientele seemed to be male, buying huge quantities of Red Bull. There was definitely one body builder – perhaps I had strayed into a specialist high protein Lidl!

I got back and did a full inner tube audit. I replaced the slow puncture with (what I thought) was my last new tube on the bike, and repaired another three. They were all blown up and left hanging on the bike. When I checked before going to bed, the back tyre was flat (clearly not a new tube, and yes I did check the tyre) but the other three were holding air well. So I’ve definitely got a tube to change in the morning.