September 28, Thelus, France to Waterloo, Belgium

By patmarkovich201539 minutes ago

This morning we needed to pack up and move on to our next and last B and B for this trip. Our destination was Waterloo, and the site of the battlefield on which Napoleon was defeated.

Today, we were meeting up with our dear friend Alan for the next couple of days before we head home. Our target meeting time was for 1 pm at the visitors centre at the Memorial of the Battle of Waterloo. Dan and I had just enough time to charge up our car before we met Alan!

Here’s something we don’t see back home. An Esso service station with gas pumps on the left hand side and EV chargers on the right hand side. Because of the extra few minutes to charge an EV, they had a wonderful little cafe with hand made sandwiches while you wait!

Like military precision, we met at the visitor’s centre at 1 pm. Alan bought us all tickets and we started at the self guided tour of the battle including a description of the troops, uniforms and progress from all sides.

The interactive self guided tour let you stop and learn about anything you chose of interest.

Here is Alan and Dan dressed up and doing their own reenactment. Unfortunately, dressed in French uniforms, their fate was already sealed!

We then went on to see the panorama view, where they give you the perspective of being in the middle of the battle field and show you what’s happening in every direction.

After that Dan and I climbed ALL the steps up the 131 foot high “Lion’s Mound”. This gave us a full 360 degree panoramic view of the Historic Waterloo battlefield.

Here’s an encampment as it might have been in 1815.

And here is the stairway leading back down. Needless to say we took a few breaks on the way up!

Here is a picture of the Lion at the top of its mound.

Here is the mound hidden behind a corn field…still very prominent in the landscape

From here we walked 1.2 km to Hougamont Farm. Which is widely considered the last authentic witness to the Battle of Waterloo. This fortified manorial farm compound was the epicentre of what the Duke of Wellington called the “battle within the battle”. Wellington famously declared that “the success of the battle turned upon the closing of the gates of Hougamont”, making it one of the most strategically significant locations in European military history.

The doors on the far left are the North Gates. While about 40 French soldiers managed to breach them they were beaten back by 10 brave English and Scottish soldiers who managed to close the gates again.

A moving sculpture by the the inside of the north gates honouring the sacrifice of all those brave soldiers.

Time to walk back to the car and head into Waterloo to our last B and B. We found it, and and quickly got ourselves in and settled…enough time to have a wee libation before heading out for supper.

Alan, myself and Dan enjoying some Belgian beer, St Bernardus 12. Delicious!

Our next stop was dinner. We headed to a restaurant that was only a 3 or 4 minute walk from our place only to find out that they weren’t serving dinner, only drinks this evening. We considered it for an instant, but decided that a proper meal would be much better for us. A young chap at this bar suggested we go to Ciao Pizza, he said it was good authentic wood fired pizza. At this point, anything sounded good, so we headed out the 1km plus walk to the city centre to this place. Tired and ready for supper, we arrived and were quickly shown to our table.

We each ordered some delectable pasta ( no one had a pizza), and as we were sitting there Alan saw a certificate on the wall that pronounced this cafe as making the list of the top 100 pizza places in the world! I guess we should go back!!

It was time to head home and being rather tired, we decided to call a cab. The proprietress tried 2 taxi companies, and no one had cars out tonight that were available. All of a sudden her husband, the chef, came out from the back room and said he would drive us home! Absolutely unbelievable !!! Not only is he an exceptional cook ( my pasta was divine!) he is a truly wonderful human being! May he have continued success with his business! If you are ever in Waterloo and looking for an amazing Italian meal ( even try the pizza!) please go to Ciao Pizza. You can’t miss it. It’s right behind the Church of St Joseph!