Jusqu’au 30 mai. Je prends le train en Belgique

Hot weather allowed for plenty of Nordic walking and a routine started to develop: Mondays at Sebourg, Tuesdays at the running track, Wednesdays in various places, Thursdays in the park, Saturdays around and about. Regular walking has had the bonus of getting to know people better, too, but I still hadn’t reached the “coffee and chat” stage with anyone.

 

 I’d recently discovered that over 65s can have a day return on Belgian trains for 6.30 euros. It seemed too good to miss so when my running friend, Ruth, said she and her husband would be spending a few days in Bruges I asked if we could meet up. They were celebrating their Silver Wedding and Ruth’s 500^th marathon. That’s not a typo.

So, on 30^th, Wilf gave me a lift to Quievrechain on his way to work and I walked over the

border to Quievrain station. It’s a frontier town and there was something of “Once Upon a Time in the West” about it, but without the guns: a large car park, the station building locked and a few passengers standing watching on the platform.

The train was, unsurprisingly, empty. Quievrain is the end of the line, literally as well as in any metaphorical sense and I’m pleased to see copies of Metro on the tables. That they’re in Flemish is a challenge but if all else fails, I should be able to attempt a Sudoku. We stop at small towns along the way. Henain may have a brewery. Jemappes definitely does. Mons……………………… Surely with a name like that there must be a hill somewhere but it seems as flat as everywhere else around. Then, five minutes later – hills! Several, in the distance. 

I continue my Flemish lesson. The page 10 headline is #Fit for Summer, with subheadings of Sporten, (I think I can guess that), Voeding (walking/jogging) and Aanpassing Levenststijl (something lifestyle). Apparently wasabi stimulates hair growth and according to my horoscope I’m going to have fun, try something new and have a meet some very exciting people. I know someone who has made up (sorry, I mean “written”) horoscopes for a well-known newspaper so I decide to just take the bits I can understand and combine them for my personal horoscope. Disappointingly, there is no Sudoku.

Soon after Mons I give up on Metro and look out at the undulating (yes, really!) farmland, wondering how many shades of brown and green I can see and if they all have names. If I include the shades of white it must run into thousands. 

We arrive in Brussels and I have to change trains. Waiting on the platform, a train pulls in opposite. Its mirrored windows reflect Yves with his Brompton folded neatly and what appears to be a one-legged man further along the platform. Ours arrives, a double-decker, so I go upstairs. The announcements are now in Flemish and French. I can’t understand either because the guard seems to have a strong Geordie accent. Fortunately I arrive in Bruges without serious mishap and look for my friends on “the Belgian side” of the station. Fortunately, Paul is tall enough to spot easily and Ruth is easy to hear as she

comes running across the square, arms wide, shouting my name. Big hugs all round. I’ve not seen her for about three years when she turned up at Ashton Court for parkrun. We’ve done several marathons “together”: at some point we’ll run together and chat, then play cat-and-mouse for a few miles before seeing  each other at the finish. I have never run near Shepperdine without having a mental image of her disappearing into the distance along the “Golden Mile” where the yellow mile markers. That was my only DNF (Did Not Finish), which rankled for a year or so until I put it right with a thirty-five miler.

We head for lunch, sharing the restaurant terrace with a school party from Perth, Scotland. The food was lovely, the beer equally so, and the talk continuous. Ruth has an amazing ability to do marathon after marathon, sometimes on consecutive days, one 100 miler. She remains, though, extremely modest about her achievements and will always help other runners. We had a great catch-up: what mutual friends have been doing, past events, plans for the future. We strolled around Bruges and I was dragged protesting into a small bar tucked away down an alley, told I couldn’t leave until I’d tried the beer. My “sensible” limit is a couple of beers, this would be my third, and Paul insisted he’d take me back to the station so I reluctantly agreed. I was glad that he had: it was lovely beer but quite strong and I was well past sensible.

 


I managed to stay awake until Brussels, then on the second part of the journey had my not-unusual “hiccup” and misheard an announcement so got off the train. I got on the next train (still not the right one), got off at the next station, got on another train, which seemed to be the one I needed. By this time the fresh air was waking me up and I hiked back safely across Quievrain and back into France to find the bus stop. A mile and a half, and about forty-five minutes, later I was on the bus back home, exhausted, hoarse and still slightly “tired.”

100% accurate horoscope, though.