This day's ride was my first with paniers. Everything that I brought with me had to fit into these two (fairly small) bags that I carried on the back of my bike. There is a definite sense of accomplishment that comes from moving yourself and everything you need from one city to another under your own power. And the added weight did not make riding that much more difficult. However, having to unpack those damn things every night and re-pack them every morning quickly got to be a drag.

Stephannie, George, and I rode out of Brugge on a towpath along a canal, passing several windmills and some farmland on the way. Things couldn't get more Flemish. After about 5k, we went through the village of Damme (where I found a Morgan car parked on the side of the road), and then picked up another canal to follow. This took us across another 20k of farmland to the town of Eeklo. Just outside of Eeklo, George had a flat. We watched him nearly disassemble his bike and then re-assemble it for an hour before proceeding. We got into Eeklo at about 1:30. I had hoped to watch the Euro 2000 champoinship there, but found out that it was on at 2:00 in New York, which was actually 8:00 in Belgium. (And the restaurant we had dinner in that night didn't have a working television, so I missed it.)

From Eeklo, we rode a series of back roads and bike paths to the edge of Gent. It was a Sunday afternoon, and it seemed like the entire country was out biking--all of them upright on old-fashioned three-speeds. We passed several entire families out for a ride together, with Grandma leading the way dressed in her Sunday best.

Gent was larger than Brugge, and looked more like a place where people lived. However, it did have it's own canals, and some truly spectacular churches and castles at the city center. Unfortunately, I saw all of this at night without my camera.

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European Biking 2000

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