Day 44 - Woudenberg to Paris

I packed up and we had breakfast and left the campsite at 9AM. We drove around to Henk's house and enjoyed coffee and a chat about Imps. Henk advised me on where to buy the things we needed and which way to go. We left around 10:20.

My plan was to use the motorway and stop to cool down as necessary. However, after about 100km I could take no more. The computer was almost discharged despite being charged up by our neighbours at the campsite. We stopped in Breda to buy a charger. However, after a long lunch I decided to buy a cheap satnav as well.

I set this to take us to Roubaix avoiding the motorways however this means passing every town in Belgium and stopping at every traffic light. So we are running just as hot as on the motorway. We stopped to wait until the day cools down in Beveren.

After this we tried a little more on the small roads but then gave up on them and returned to the motorway. By then it was cooling down and allowed us to get to Roubaix, after a couple of navigational diversions. The railway station at Roubaix was completely abandoned with no signs of more trains that night. By now it was after 10PM but we thought we would take a short walk to look at the lay of the land. Almost everything was closed but we came to a pub come disco with just the barman and a DJ there. The boys used their toilets while I asked about trains. It seems I should have stopped in Lille as that is where the trains to Paris go from.

Rather than driving back to Lille and trying to find beds for the night, I decided to drive on to Paris.  This was only 250 km away but it took us until 3AM to arrive. We stopped at a motorway services for food and to book a room over the internet. The kitchen had closed and what was left was dreadfully expensive and otherwise dreadful. However, I booked a cheap hotel in Muedon outside Paris city to the South West. About 15km from the hotel there was an accident on the motorway that closed all 4 or 5 lanes down for about an hour and a half. We could do nothing but sit and wait and watch the natives.