Steeve Burgy en Sylvie Burgy Spoerry
We start the Eurovelo 19 last summer 2021, we cycle from Langres to Charleville-Mézières, it was on small routes with almost no traffic but some steep climbs. This region is very green, landscape of grass fiels with cows and the small Maas river is very beautiful. The travel was nice, we saw the city were Jeanne D'arc was born, the Verdun battlefields, the castle of Sedan and nice historic center of Charleville. This summer we start in Charleville, the part in the Ardennes is the most beautiful with the cycling path along the winding Maas. We cross the border in Givet and from there, the Maas is really bigger with big ships and big cities to visit in Belgium.
Dinant, Namur and Liège have nice citadel. A lot of castle along the river, in some you can even sleep. We did not notice any change when we cross the border to Nederland, just more people in the cities. The Fietsroute are so nice in this country. With the fietsknooppunten it's so easy to travel. We had difficulties to find a hotel near Maastricht because of the concerts of André Rieu, we had to cycle to Germany 30km further to find some place to sleep.
The day after in Roermond it was the same. This is the risk in summer holidays when you don't book in advance. We we always managed to find some place to sleep and eat (With the help of Booking or Airbnb). The fortified cities of Heusden, Woudrichem and Brielle are very nice. The old towns of Bois-le-duc, Dordrecht and Rotterdam are fantastic. And the natural reserves of Maasduinen and Biesbosch are very quiet and preserved.
The arrival in the international harbour of Maasvlakte is very impressing with the boat trip in the FutureLand. The return by train through Germany was a little hard but we managed it with regional trains. The 1400km biking along the Maas were a pleasure. Thanks for all the roadsigns along the way, they were helpful.
