Date: 20180216
Time: 09:05 – 17:35
Distance: 35,3 km
Walkers: Gerben, Frank, Rob
Walk
Now that we have completed the Pieterpad, we have decided to go to Santiago de Compostella. We’ll see how far we get …
The first route we are going to walk is from Maastricht to Reims.
Our walk starts with a double route (because each of the routes is a bit short), from Maastricht via Visé to Liège. Because that is quite a distance, we can stop in Bressoux, which saves us about 4 kilometers and 1-2 kilometers to the station in Liège. We’ll see how things work out.
Because we have a big walk ahead, we leave on time. We take the train to Maastricht at 8:08 in Tegelen. The train journey is going well (that is not always the case here in The Netherlands).
Just after 9:00 we start our walk that begins near the train station along the Meuse. We will continue to follow the Meuse largely today. First in Maastricht and then outside of Maastricht through parks and fields.
Then we walk towards Visé. This is not the best part, we walk partly through industrial sites and along rather boring parts through fields. We do pass Eijsden, where it is better. At a given moment we walk along the motorway.
In Visé we cross the motorway and we take a short break to have a drink. In restaurant L’autobus we are only welcome when we dine extensively. That was not our intention, but luckily we are shown the way to a pub (although we also would have found that ourselves). At D’Artagnan we have a Tripel Karmeliet and Jus d’orange for Gerben.
We suspect that the rest of the trip may be disappointing because we will be walking though Liège and this is rather industrial and dirty. However, we are pleasantly surprised when we instead walk over the hills a short distance from the Meuse, in the middle of nature, through forests and later through fields. A very nice environment.
Unfortunately, Gerben has pain in his foot. Although he indicated in Visé that it was alright, it does not go so well at times. He tries if a walking stick helps and sometimes it does. He does not complain, just keeps walking and keeps a good mood. However, our pace is now considerably lower. We therefore decide not to go further than Bressoux. That is far enough and it is also late enough.
In Jupille-sur-Meuse we enter Liège and then we walk through the urban area (not the most beautiful part of the route) to Bressoux. Unfortunately, there is no pub or anything like that. So we have to wait until tonight for a well-deserved beer on the couch.
We are looking for the train station and that proves to be difficult. Then, however, from a bridge we spot a small platform in the middle of a lot of railway lines. There is even a working machine to get tickets and we are lucky, the train runs every hour and we only have to wait less than fifteen minutes.
We have a smooth journey back home, with coffee and Cola from the Kiosk in Maastricht.
The route was not really marked, we mainly walked on the GPS and on the maps that I printed. We did see various markings with the shell (pilgrim path), but these would not have been enough to follow the route.
All in all a nice start of our pilgrimage to Santiago de Compostella.
We walked the following routes:
- On trodden paths / Maastricht – Visé (gpx)
- To the city of Saint-Jacques / Visé – Liège (until station Bressoux) (gpx)
Weather
Today we had perfect walking weather, sunny, dry and about 8°C. It was however quite muddy and soggy. On several occasions we had to find our way along large puddles of water or large mud pools.
References
- De Weg van de Franken I, Ben Theunissen, ISBN 978-90-484-3026-0
- www.dewegvandefranken.nl
- www.gpsies.com/mapUser.do?username=Pelgrimswegen
- www.gpsies.com/mapFolder.do?id=2131