Everything was damp because of the humidity and cloud cover today, so I took it easy over muesli and coffee and waited for the sun to make a difference. It barely did a thing.
I thought I’d go towards Maastricht today. That keeps more options open for the coming days.
I’d just made it out of the campground before my phone rang. It was Minou, so, I pulled in near a frequently opening bridge and had a chat. There’s a surprising number of commercial boats on the small canal. The bike path followed one side of the canal until it hit some canal refurbishment in progress. The canal is lined on both sides with vertical logs more than two metres long and there was a machine on a barge, removing them. That’s a lot of logs, but it meant that they had installed a temporary bridge across the canal and thereafter, I had a grassy dirt path to follow through the area of Mol. Very nice.
I made a couple of other crossings, but generally stayed on the main canal which grew steadily wider as its banks became more industrial. I turned off it to go to a supermarket in Balen then cound a cafe for a very relaxed coffee. I then followed an old tramway to the outskirts of the town. A boring day seemed a foregone conclusion after riding beside a fairly busy road for some kilometres, but things got more interesting.
First there was the road that was closed due to roadwork, but nobody was working, so I had a few kilometres of traffic free riding. I rode on the left hand side for old time’s sake. That took me to a forest, and the path wound it’s way through some really nice wooded areas, then kept going and going. That’s when Timo called and it was great to chat with him. Back on the path, and it was more of the same until the nice town of Genk.
On leaving Genk, my mate Martin called. Again, it was great to talk, but it was now after 6pm and I still had 20kms to go. As well, the cloud cover made it quite dark, and I didn’t want to cop any more ‘only in the last 10kms’ rain. I crossed the Dutch border and made my way into Maastricht which looked like it was ready to party but the fun people had gone home. It was suffering from the end of the summer holidays.
I’d booked a hotel because I wanted to stay close to town and have a look around. Unfortunately, by the time I’d got to my room and cleaned up, it was getting fairly late, so I grabbed some dinner and turned in for the night.
