4. Belgian Beercycling 2000: A lobster evening at La Cave à Bière, Danes included.

As we rode our bikes down narrow Wallonian country lanes, not far removed from the outskirts of Tournai and our base camp at the Hotel d’Alcantara, a clear and warm summer Saturday afternoon suddenly turned blustery and overcast.

The Cochonette-laced warm fuzzies from a lengthy session at Brasserie à Vapeur on its monthly brewing day dissipated rapidly in the face of a brisk headwind, made more formidable by legs still tired from the previous day’s mountain biking excursion in the woods and fields of the Pays du Collines.

However, the sobering return workout was all for the best, because a taxing celebratory evening still lay ahead.

Awaiting our return at the hotel were the Three Danes of the Apocalypse: Kim Wiesener, Kim Andersen and Allan Gamborg. Coincidentally, they had gathered in Wallonia for the European football (soccer) championships being held in the summer of 2000 at various venues throughout Belgium and the Netherlands, and after being made aware of our beercycling visit, conspired to include us in the itinerary.

These three cosmopolitan natives of Denmark are bosom friends of long standing, each of them multilingual, well-traveled and professionally accomplished in his chosen field. When a football match is taking place, each of them also is prone to reverting with dazzling speed to a childlike state, one understood internationally and intuitively by all sporting males.

Their life stories would fill a volume, and such a biographical rendering lies beyond my immediate task of describing the 2000 beercycling trip, but according to tradition, I’m permitted one digression. Here it is, in one of several versions.

Back in the day …

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My friendship with the Danes goes back to 1987, and is inexorably intertwined with that of my illustrious longtime partner in crime, Barrie Ottersbach, who was unable to join us in Tournai in 2000.

That fateful summer of ‘87, an unsuspecting Kim Wiesener was the tour leader for a “youth” travel group visiting the Soviet Union and Poland, and Barrie and I were enthusiastic and only marginally youthful participants (we were 27).

Legend has it that Kim fell under Barrie’s spell (or was it the other way around?) on a hair-raising Aeroflot flight from Copenhagen to Moscow, where I joyously met the group, having arrived in the capital of the evil empire by way of a 36-hour train trip from Hungary during which I was kept company by a bag of fresh cherries, two loaves of bread, a salami from Szeged and two bottles of Bull’s Blood wine.

On the morning following the boozy evening of the group’s belated arrival, all of us were supposed to meet in the hotel lobby before setting out for a bus tour of Moscow. Kim was mildly concerned when Barrie failed to appear for roll call; I reassured him that all was well, and that Barrie was in safe hands, having ventured into the Soviet underworld with “Bill,” the friendly neighborhood black market sales representative who I’d met earlier under similar circumstances.

At that point, and not even a full day into the excursion, Kim understood that it would be a long journey, but he was reassured when Barrie appeared later that afternoon brandishing a softball-sized wad of colorful rubles. For the remainder of our stay in the USSR, Barrie gleefully depleted the ridiculously huge bankroll on lavish restaurant meals, caviar, vodka and champagne; beer was difficult to find, and the rubles worthless elsewhere in the world.

For a brief time, Barrie himself occupied a sales representative position on the fringe of the black market, profitably reselling rubles back into hard currency for those members of our group who were too frightened or squeamish to trade on the streets.

This introductory lesson in entrepreneurial initiative duly completed, we moved on to Leningrad (now St. Petersburg) by overnight express train just in time for an impromptu Fourth of July celebration. Kim, Barrie and I gathered on the grassy, mosquito-infested bank of an urban canal, a scene made complete when a bottle of the finest Russian vodka materialized from Kim’s backpack. Illuminated by the White Night, we were introduced for the first time to Allan, who was passing through the city with a tour group of his own.

Midnight at the Oasis, 1987.

Ominously, as the bottle was passed around, its contents ingested and people slowly got to know each other, Kim and Allan began speaking in hushed tones about Denmark’s answer to Barrie: Kim Andersen, hereafter to be known as Big Kim. Their descriptions of Big Kim were offered to us in impeccable English, although occasionally they would lapse into Danish or even Russian in search of the proper words to explain this larger-than-life phenomenon.

Brief stays in the oppressed Baltic lands of Latvia and Lithuania followed Leningrad, and then Warsaw and Krakow, with too many anecdotal tales to remember, much less relate: Hoisting Nick’s American flag above the hotel in Leningrad, and then watching him trading it to a railway employee for a huge tub of caviar … an elderly fellow tourist mistaking the liquid in our vodka bottle for mineral water and gulping it down on a scorching hot day at the Polish-Soviet border as we waited for the train’s wheel carriages to be changed … building the “Leaning Tower of Pivo” from empty export Carlsberg cans in a Riga hard currency bar … the well-endowed Danish lass Metta’s provocative push-ups at a meet-and-greet with Lithuanian students … wild going-away parties in Warsaw, where Barrie and I drank wine with our leggy blonde Polish tour guide and a few of the group’s stragglers before departing for the city’s cavernous train station and commencing desperate and futile foraging for food and drink prior to the long ride to Prague and our first taste of draft Pilsner Urquell.

Our amazing, hyperkinetic tour leader Kim Wiesener was right in the thick of most of these anecdotes, and at the conclusion of the trip we exchanged addresses with him, promising to keep in touch. In fact, Barrie and Kim agreed to meet later that summer, when Barrie would return to Copenhagen for his flight back to the United States. You can bet that even then, Kim’s wheels were spinning: What could be done to bring Barrie and Big Kim together in Copenhagen?

In the meantime, Barrie and I embarked upon the beer-based itinerary that we had plotted in advance for the remainder of our time in Europe, first traveling from Prague to Munich, where we met Don Barry and Bob Gunn for three epochal days of Bavarian beer hall carousing, then in the company of Bob to Paris and the D-Day beaches. Barrie and I crossed to Ireland aboard the “Guinness ferry”, meeting Tommy Barker, a newspaperman and good friend of Don’s, and later watching U2 perform at the Cork soccer stadium, then experiencing the wonders of Brian and his “High-B” Hibernian Pub, all the while marveling at the classic pleasures of the Irish countryside.

As the revelry continued, I didn’t think there would be enough time for me to accompany Barrie to Denmark and then double back to Brussels and my own return flight, but at a pub somewhere in Ireland, after my tenth pint of Guinness, I changed my mind.

Barrie and I concocted a plan to surprise Kim Wiesener with my delightfully unexpected presence, and we refined the insidious plot over smoked salmon and Bailey’s Irish Cream while aboard the ship back to France. In Paris, we caught an overnight train to Copenhagen, and contrary to so many plans that Barrie and I have made over the years, this one came perfectly to fruition.

Soon after debarking in Copenhagen we were reunited, burrowed safely in Kim’s tiny apartment with chilled Tuborgs in hand and songs in our hearts. Following opening toasts, our devious host divulged his own surprise: An evening with Big Kim had already been arranged. Finally, Ottersbach would meet Andersen, and the world was advised to forget the “Thrilla in Manila”; instead, onlookers were to get ready for the “Battle of the Titans,” to be held in the beer venue called the Elephant & Mouse, or Mouse and Elephant, where we were informed there would be copious quantities of draft Elephant beer, Carlsberg’s fine, sturdy and strong lager.

It was to be our first visit to the M & E, a small and dignified pub near the main square, where the only sign of identification above the front door is a small plaque depicting – what else? – a mouse and an elephant. On the second floor of the pub, a handmade elephant head adorns the wall behind the wall. Draft Elephant Beer pours from the snout; the tusk is the tap handle.*

Big Kim arrived along with Graham, a British friend who, like Kim Wiesener and I, chose to nurse just a couple of half-liter glasses (at $7 a pop, somewhat financially burdensome at the time) while watching the spectacle unfold. As predicted, Big Kim and Barrie proved to be perfectly matched human beings, both with a fondness for alcohol of any sort, hot and spicy food in large quantities, impossibly tall tales and jokes, and endless, infectious tsunamis of irresistible laughter.

Big Kim and Barrie approached the high-gravity Elephant Beer at full throttle, and much merriment ensued. Somewhere around the fourth or fifth one, Barrie stumbled; accounts vary, but we’ll gently infer that some of the Elephant Beer didn’t stay down.

Advantage, Andersen.

After several hours, and with monetary reserves reaching dangerously low levels, we decided to continue drinking at an establishment where Metta (of Lithuanian push-up fame) worked as a bartender. As we stood on the street corner contemplating taxi strategies, Big Kim suddenly broke free of the group and wildly staggered into the middle of the street in an effort to hail a cab to take him home. We quickly subdued him, dodging cars and loading him into our own taxi to proceed to the next planned stop.

With this unforced error of Big Kim’s, Ottersbach had again pulled even.

Now it was a brutal battle of attrition, with the clock ticking and everyone involved drunk and fatigued. Both Barrie and Big Kim made it through big export bottles of Pilsner Urquell at the second bar, after which we returned to Kim Wiesener’s apartment for obligatory nightcaps, the outcome still very much in doubt. Barrie and Big Kim both opened their bottled beers. Barrie finished his, but Big Kim stole away, ostensibly to use the toilet, and was found a short time later sleeping on the host’s bed.

Seemingly, it was a victory for Ottersbach, but as all concerned were physically unable to tally points in their besotted condition, the Battle of the Titans was fittingly declared a draw.

Many years have passed since that epic summer and our first meeting with Kim, Allan and Big Kim. Certainly all of us have changed, but the friendship lives on. We five have met many times, in many places, and too many for me to remember (Allan would love for me to relate the story of the “Danish lunch” at his apartment in 1989, the orange couch and the real meaning of P-F-L, but it will have to wait for another session), but they’ve all been special – as I knew the meeting in Tournai would be, even if Barrie couldn’t be a part of it.

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The lady of the Cave.

Big Kim.

Bob.

From left to right: Bob, Kim A., Roger, Kevin, Kim W., Buddy and Allan.

So it was that the beercyclists returning from the Renaissance brewer’s regularly scheduled seminar met the football-loving Danes at the hotel as scheduled, and we began haggling over the details of the evening’s festivities. The non-negotiable idea, as conveyed to me with much wagging of fingers, was to partake of the scheduled feast of lobster tail and ale at the La Cave à Bière at the precise time of the hour-long break between matches, both of which were far too important for the aficionados to miss.

Barrie’s absence was widely lamented, and each of us resolved to drink one or more beers for him, although we recognized that it would have taken far more than that to keep him going had he actually been present.

We set off on foot to search for a suitable place to watch sports, and a big screen television was duly located in a café just off the main square. There we settled into the Turkey-Portugal match with the help of draft Hoegaarden Wit, which served as a gentle restorative following the biking and imbibing rigors of the day. I stole away and walked down to the riverfront o tell the matron at the La Cave à Bière that we’d be a bit late for dinner owing to the imperative of sports. She rolled her eyes and smiled indulgently: Let boys be boys, and there’d still be enough food and beer left whenever we made it back.

Soon it became apparent that the critical match-up wasn’t taking place on the television screen. Much in the same way that Big Kim’s initial meeting with Barrie resembled a gladiatorial marathon, the merry Dane’s previous experience with Kevin Richards – an all-day beer-drinking session during one of Big Kim’s visits to New Albany – had been both effusive and expansive. Now there was renewal.

Appropriately, upon our arrival at the Cave for what was intended as a brief respite between matches, Kevin began urging Big Kim to join him at the high-gravity end of the Belgian brewing spectrum, and together they began despoiling the café’s excellent selection of Trappist ales: Rochefort, Chimay, Westmalle and Orval. The rest of us gamely followed suit, and to my surprise, as the stock of Trappists began to deplete to the accompaniment of a happily ringing cash register, the second soccer match was largely forgotten.

In short, yet another memorable evening had begun, and in the fashion of such gatherings, all betting ceased, and an internal logic took over. It would have to be respected.

Lobster tails and side orders of potatoes and vegetables soon appeared on the table and were quickly devoured, and the steady stream of Belgian ale, divided among the usual suspects, produced the expected tomfoolery and an escalating series of tales that purported to depict exploits of past drinking bouts. I recall a cell phone appearing, and an attempt to call Barrie. In the general cacophony, it isn’t clear whether the call ever went through, although our absent Musketeer later swore that not only was the call duly received, but that the phone was never properly shut off and he was left with twenty minutes of jocularity recorded on his answering machine for perpetual enjoyment.

The otherwise stern matron of the Cave seemed much amused at our antics and presided over the international gathering with grace, going so far as to pose willingly for a photo with Buddy. I made no attempt to take notes on the beers or to record what I’d sampled, seeing as all were old favorites that had treated me well before, and could be expected to be as forgiving again.

Bob blessed the raucous group numerous times: “Here’s to us … ” Kim, Allan and I recalled our previous 1999 meeting in Moscow, reliving the evening of the metal detector at the brewpub, the private table dancer who wasn’t minding the mint, and shoes filled with Volga mud. Big Kim and Kevin continued knocking them back at a prodigious pace.

At some point much later in the evening, through the haze of three too many Trappists, but after there had been a monetary settlement, I watched as Kevin, Big Kim, Allan and Bob Reed suddenly rose from their seats and filed out with the solemnity of a funeral procession – except it was they who were embalmed. Their destination was unclear. Apparently it was time to go, so Kim Wiesener and I pulled Buddy from the arms of our hostess and the three of us began weaving back to the hotel through darkened, damp streets, kicking at the litter left behind by revelers on a festive summer’s evening.

It was a stone cold sleep. I was curious next morning, so I asked Kevin: When you left the Cave, was it because Allan had called a taxi to take all of you back to the hotel? Kevin scratched his head and confessed to not remembering whether they had been driven or walked. Moments later, I asked Bob the same question, and he couldn’t recall, either. Suspecting it would be useless to ask Big Kim, I received confirmation of the taxi order from a shrugging Allan.

We went our separate ways on Sunday morning after breakfast, the Danes moving out by rental car to attend the next Eurocup match-up, and the bikers heading west by train to Poperinge and the second phase of the journey.

In the next installment, we commence a love affair with the good people of Poperinge.

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* Sadly, the pub is no more.

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3. Belgian Beercycling 2000: Brewing day with Jean-Louis at Brasserie A Vapeur.

(Bear in mind that this account was written in 2001; some facts may no longer be factual.)

Wallonia is the French-speaking half of Belgium. The cultural and linguistic divide between Wallonia and the Dutch-speaking Flanders is deep seated, politically charged, well documented and completely beyond the scope of this account, so I’ll confine my opening comments to observations that are safer and more relevant to beercyclists: Geography.

Landscapes in Wallonia vary. To the south and east, the low, wooded hills known as the Ardennes are darkly mysterious, enduringly scenic and sparsely populated. North of the Ardennes, stretching westward through the Meuse River valley from Liege to Namur, then along the Sambre River to Charleroi and Mons, runs an area similar to what Americans know as a “Rust Belt.”

The industrial revolution on the European continent took root and exploded in these environs during the early 19th century, with an emphasis on coal mining and heavy industries producing steel, glass and cement. As in other regions of the developed world, these old industries have been steadily contracting for decades, and the goal of every fair-sized municipality is to relieve the European Union of wheelbarrows filled with developmental money and to use the largess to create miniature Silicon Valleys behind the slag heaps, brownfields and abandoned factories.

The city of Mons (a battleground in World War I) is the capital of Hainaut province, the westernmost in Wallonia. Beginning in Mons, and continuing westward to Tournai, the terrain begins to flatten into what eventually becomes the Flanders plain stretching to the Atlantic. The industrial zone remains evident along the Sambre River and then the Escaut (in Flemish, the Scheldt), but it is intermixed with landscape of a more pastoral character.

The towns and villages reflect these differing influences. There are tidy modern cottages and the homes of people who commute to work in the larger towns. Next to them, one might see the manure-caked tractor of a family still engaged in farming. Crops in Hainaut include wheat, oats, sugar beets, chicory – and yes, barley. A simple bike ride through the countryside yields abundant olfactory evidence of hogs and cattle.

Even in the tiniest settlements, there usually can be seen sturdy, drafty brick buildings and rust-stained ground. Back in the day these were workshops and factories, the smaller satellites of the industrial complexes concentrated elsewhere. Many of these relics now are dilapidated, while others have been reclaimed and are used as auto body shops, storage facilities, art studios, or for whatever modern purpose that they can be adapted and renovated to serve.

Although it is certain all these archaic red brick buildings have historical stories to tell, it’s just as unlikely that one would find any of them, apart from farming structures, still being used for the purpose originally intended. Even if this would be the case, it’s a considerable stretch to fantasize the work still being performed in the way it was in olden times.

Yet this is the case at the Brasserie à Vapeur, a brewery housed in a utilitarian relic of the 19th century located in the sleepy village of Pipaix. It's a thoroughly “retro” operation helmed since 1984 by the the indefatigable Jean-Louis Dits.

Brewing at this location began in 1795, and all the heat and power for the brewing operation is generated by steam, this being the result of an extensive “modernization” -- undertaken in 1895!

Upon closer examination, the boiler is of recent vintage, and there are stainless steel fermenters (open fermentation having been abandoned several years ago). Various spare and replacement parts also are of newer vintage, but in amazing measure the brewery operates as it would have when Queen Victoria reigned and Louisville KY had a major league baseball team.

I’d seen the Vapeur (“steam”) brewery previously in 1998 during the first homemade group tour of Belgium, but in 2000 our biking group had a timely opportunity not possible two years before: We would be able to visit Vapeur during the actual brewing process, which takes place only once each month and is open to the public.

Riding bikes to the Vapeur brewing day? Priceless.

Saturday morning in Tournai was cool and cloudy. It had spit rain intermittently during the night as we crawled from café to couscouserie and back to café, absorbing ales great and small. Heavier rain wasn't expected on Saturday, but it mattered little to us, as there were far too many activities planned for the day. If we became wet, so be it.

The morning’s ride began absent precipitation along the bank of the Escaut in the center of Tournai, taking us quickly across the river and to the outskirts, where an access road to the highway ran east toward Leuze. Although heavily traveled, the bike lane provided suitable buffering from the roar of passing traffic. Pedaling through a succession of villages clustered around the old highway, it was noted that the scene was similar to that glimpsed along roads anywhere: Gas stations, video stores, cafes, and dozens of ordinary people tending to weekend chores.

Upon spotting a sign that pointed the way toward Pipaix, we exited south onto a smaller, less noisy highway and entered a verdant countryside filled with fields, farms, villages, rows of trees ... and breweries.

In fact, our quartet of amateurs was cycling into a veritable Golden Triangle of artisan Belgian brewing, because nearby in this portion of rural Hainaut province, almost within walking distance of each other, are three world-class breweries: Vapeur, our archaic destination for the day; Dubuisson, home of the heavenly 12% Bush Beer (known as Scaldis in America); and Dupont, preserver of the tradition of Saison, or Belgian farmhouse ale.

Dubuisson dates from 1769, and the eighth generation of its founding family runs the business today. In addition to brewing, the company is a beer wholesaler, and it exports Bush/Scaldis throughout the world. Since the 2000 trip, a sleek new tasting café has risen on the site, testament to the family’s faith in the future of quality ale.

In like fashion, Dupont began its working life in 1850 as the Brasserie Rimaux, which was taken over by the current owning family in 1920. The family now brews, malts barley, bakes bread, makes cheese, and does a little farming on the side. Dupont was a Belgian pioneer in brewing organic beer, and in contract brewing for other companies in the country. The brewery’s ales, which like Dubuisson’s are aggressively exported, include Saison Dupont (I), Moinette (II), and the delicious seasonal Avec les Bons Voeux (III).

Where else in Belgium can be found three breweries of such high quality, located so close together? We’d have liked to make a pilgrimage to each of them; however, because of the novelty of Vapeur’s brewing day, it would be the sole destination, with the others reserved for subsequent journeys.

After a hard left off the main road, perhaps two kilometers and a few puzzled moments trying to locate the village of Pipaix, the unprecedented and grudging step of asking a village passer-by to point the way to Vapeur was undertaken. He shrugged and pointed. It was the building just behind us, perhaps twenty yards away.

Embarrassment ensued. Couldn’t we smell the mash?

Bikes were abandoned and we followed our noses into the brewery, where Jean-Louis Dits, his assistant and Jean-Louis’s wife were hard at work before a handful of interested onlookers.

By almost any standard of measurement, Jean-Louis is a Renaissance man whose talents extend beyond brewing renowned ales like Cochonne, Saison Pipaix and Folie. He is an educator, a naturalist, a museum curator, a cheese maker and a bread baker.

To visit Vapeur on the monthly brewing day is to attend an eclectic seminar about all things germane to Pipaix, one taught by a passionate, patient, bilingual instructor. You will learn about the medicinal lichen that once was an ingredient in Vapeur’s beer, but that has been degraded by air pollution.

You will learn of the many breweries that once operated in the area, and how so few remain today.

You will learn about the power of the steam and the system of pulleys and shifting drive belts, and just when stirring of the mash grinds to a halt and it’s time to let nature work, the lecture abruptly ceases, the bell figuratively rings, and recess begins – thankfully, without any need for dodge ball.

At Vapeur on brewing day, resting the mash is rushing the growler. Everyone is guided across the courtyard to the tasting room, where ample pitchers of draft house brews are passed along the wooden tables and a contagious communal appreciation envelops the surroundings.

Jean-Louis noted that lunch would be served for those willing to ante a small fee. In these simpler pre-Euro times of 2000, roughly $12.00 sufficed for the museum admission, the many “recess” beers and the meal. He described lunch as a simple plate of bread and locally made cheeses.

It turned out to be anything but simple: Two enormous platters laden with cheeses – hard and soft, white and yellow, stinky and mild, some incorporating locally grown herbs, and taken together, all quite overwhelming to the already besieged senses. Crusty crumbs and cultured shards flew, pitchers of Cochonne continued to appear with breathtaking speed, and we began to fear the ride back to Tournai.

As trained professionals, we persevered, toasted, drank, and ate more cheese than any human should attempt. Back in the brewery, it was approaching the time for the boil (the wort is pumped upstairs to the brew kettle), but we concluded with much sadness that because of the evening festivities planned in Tournai, it was time for us to bid “adieu” to Jean-Louis and his grand, archival Vapeur brewery. He graciously consented to a photo-op in the courtyard, which for some reason turned out somewhat blurry to the camera lens, and we were off to retrace the path.

It never rained … but the deluge was only just beginning.

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Next: Returning to Tournai, we discover Danes waiting in ambush at the Hotel d’Alcantara, proceed to La Cave à Bière, and lose contact with Mission Control.

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2. Belgian Beercycling 2000: Tournai warm-up, Cave a Bieres and Pays du Collines.

Back in 2000, the city of Tournai (Doornik in Flemish) seldom surfaced in prospective Belgian beer-hunting itineraries. The omission was understandable on the surface of it, though a closer look proved very beneficial for us.

This historic city of 70,000, famed for its Cathedrale de Notre-Dame and UNESCO world heritage belfry, possessed no working breweries.*

Furthermore, there was only one specialty beer café, La Cave à Bière**, deemed worthy of mention in the British writer Tim Webb’s essential guidebook of the time, The Good Beer Guide to Belgium and Holland.

Nonetheless, we elected to make Tournai our home for the first three days of the inaugural biking and beer-hunting Belgian holiday, a choice primarily reflecting the city's relative proximity to top-flight breweries in the countryside. Also, our choice of accommodations, the Hotel d’Alcantara, had inexpensive bicycles available for use in reaching these beer places.

Just how inexpensive soon became apparent.

We never regretted those Tournai days. Apart from brewery proximity, the city proved intriguing in its own right. Founded as a Roman settlement, Tournai was ceded, regained, swapped and passed around between various feudal and imperial powers for much of its history. The vibe was relaxed, with a pleasing mixture of new and old Europe.

Tournai suffered damage in both of the 20th-century’s European conflagrations, and in World War II, it had the distinction of being the first Belgian city to be liberated from the Nazis. In addition to the cathedral and belfry, there were plenty of shadowy back streets to explore, as well as the Escaut River's eclectic pathway through the city, which included a squat, massive 13th-century bridge we found fascinating.

The otherwise attractive Grand Place (central square) seemed to function primarily as a huge car park, though it had a strange on-again, off-again sidewalk fountain made possible by European Union economic development funds.

Photo credit.

The square was ringed by respectable, if not spectacular, pubs and cafes where the thirsty beer traveler might reliably find mid-range selections as well as predictably good espresso and snacks.

(My last visit to Tournai came in 2004. What's it like now?)

Roughly ten miles west of Tournai is the French city of Lille. We didn’t have time to visit Lille in 2000, but it was considered a center of northern French brewing even then, with many beer bars in the city center and breweries in its outskirts. I'm told it's only gotten better since.

The rural Brunehaut brewery is located ten miles south of Tournai; it dates from 1992 and makes several fine ales available locally and throughout Belgium. One beer that stood out from the rest was a specialty Brunehaut ale spiked with Genever, a distilled counterpart to gin, and indigenous to the Low Countries.

Twenty miles northeast of Tournai is the region known as the Pays du Collines, which is a rural area of low hills, towns, patches of woods, farms, and a recently renewed focus on ecotourism. With the invaluable assistance of a Hotel d’Alcantara staffer, we booked a guided mountain bike tour of the Pays du Collines for our second day in town.

Most importantly, ten miles east of Tournai there is an amazing concentration of classic, small breweries, each just a few kilometers from the others: Dubuisson, maker of the incredible Bush strong ale (known as Scaldis in the USA); Dupont, brewer of classic Saison ales; and Vapeur, the archaic steam-powered museum/brewery scheduled for a visit on Day Three.

Before mountain biking Friday and brewery schmoozing Saturday, there was an open biking day Thursday. We had plenty of raw adrenaline, but not much of a plan. Having examined the four bikes and found them to be rickety but serviceable, we chatted with the friendly hotel manager, who suggested charting a course for Mont St. Aubert, a few miles north of Tournai. This choice seemed as good as any, so we followed the manager’s directions.

Along the way, our quartet received an introduction to the joys of biking and bruising over dry cobblestone streets; wet cobblestones were yet to come and provided thrills of an even greater magnitude. These gave way to smoother paved roads as we left the inner city area and entered the more modern districts on the outskirts.

Following signs into the countryside, the hill could be seen clearly, looming ahead of us. Climbing it was a challenge, with each of us having only a handful of gears in operating condition, but we made it to the top and were rewarded with a spectacular view of Tournai and the surrounding region.

Actually, some of us made it in better condition than others. When you see Buddy Sandbach at the Public House, ask him the French pronunciation of “Ralph.”

Curiously, it’s almost the same as the American.

Bob Reed had thoughtfully procured a map of the area, and using it we rode off on country lanes, through the surrounding farmlands and their reassuring aromas of fodder and dung, eventually coming to the town of Pecq. From there we took immaculately groomed bike paths along the river back into Tournai.

It was unlikely that we rode more than 15 miles all day, but the historical significance of this inaugural bicycling foray simply cannot be exaggerated.

It didn’t matter at all that the bicycles were inferior. During the course of European travels dating back to 1985, I’d traveled by rail, bus, boat, automobile, and on foot. All of the previous experiences were special in their own way, but in the year 2000 – for the first time in years – I felt exhilaration and the pure joy of discovery. Perhaps rediscovery is a better word.

Kevin Richards and I had talked about it for months, and now we’d done it, and I immediately understood. I was hooked. Puffing up Mont St. Aubert, I knew Europe would never be the same for me.

We were judicious and kept the ride short the first day, devoting the remainder of the afternoon to walking through town, pausing to have a restorative ale in the street level café of the Hotel Europ (Bush Blonde, an easy-drinking, elegant 10.5% ale), then dining on beefsteak and fries at a nearby restaurant.

The aforementioned La Cave à Bière, then considered Tournai’s finest specialty beer café, opened at 5:00 p.m.

La Cave à Bière was revealed to be a variant of the “shotgun” bar, filling space below street level mere yards from the river in a venerable old European warehouse. The walls and vaulted brick ceiling were painted white, with a small bar, big wooden tables and chairs lining both sides of a central walkway, and Belgian brewing memorabilia nailed everywhere.

The café appeared to be run by a male head waiter and a female chef, perhaps husband and wife, perhaps not, but with the latter being firmly in charge of the proceedings. In addition to a bottled beer list of 75 to 100 choices, there were typical Belgian café snacks, and as we were to discover on Saturday evening, tasty full meals on weekends.

Settling in, I concentrated on regional ales: Brunehaut, Quintine and Dupont. Vapeur was available, but there’d be plenty of that on Saturday at the monthly brewing day in Pipaix.

On Friday morning following an exemplary hotel breakfast, it was time for yet another new adventure. Etienne, a teacher, coach and superbly conditioned all-around athlete, loaded us into his pristine van for the trip to the rural Pays du Collines for the day’s mountain biking excursion.

At a sparkling new athletic club in a town on the periphery, we were introduced to our snazzy fat-tired bikes and met Etienne’s bubbly aunt, who would be following us in her car and stopping occasionally to provide commentary in English.

Etienne confessed to speaking only French, but as usually is the case in such times, we were able to communicate wonderfully through gestures and snippets. With regard to mountain biking technique, Etienne showed us what to do, and we followed his lead.

Off we pedaled into the beautiful natural area for an unforgettable day. For Bob, Buddy and I, it was a first-time experience on a mountain bike, off-road in the rough – over steep hills in the mud, across dirt paths in wide, cleared fields, and through old railroad cuts in the woods. Kevin and Etienne bonded immediately, finding a common language in their love of sporting endeavors.

Along the way we stopped at a traditional farmstead to view an old mill under restoration, and visited a museum of local culture for an exhibit telling the story of the small workshops once common to Hainaut province, which made products like wooden shoes.

Two hours into the ride, Etienne took us to his mother’s rectangular brick farmstead for juice, coffee and pastries. Later, in the village of Ellezelle, there was a much appreciated re-hydration sag at the Brasserie Ellezelloise.

At the time of our visit to the isolated country micro/brewpub, its high quality ales in stopper bottles all were brewed in-house. Since then, production has been transferred to Brasserie Des Légendes, a brewery nearby. Hercule, an intense, high-gravity sweet stout named for fictional detective Hercule Poirot, remains the pick of the litter.

Etienne took care to point us in the direction of Ellezelle's pay-to-spray witch, squatting atop a waist-high pedestal, a regional symbol often compared to the Mannekin-Pis in Brussels by virtue of its ... plumbing. On normal days, one puts coins into the adjacent slot, and if you're unlucky, only water comes shooting out from beneath the witch’s skirt … but during magical times, beer flows instead -- or so we were told.

Just remember to bring a cup in case of magic.

At the end of the afternoon, we retired to the posh local club within the athletic complex and drank a round of Hoegaardens to Etienne, a superlative guide and true gentleman.

How many YMCAs in America even have bars?

For a second consecutive evening back in Tournai, the consensus choice for dinner was couscous (kews-kews), the North African ethnic delight as widely available in Tournai as Chinese or Mexican is in Southern Indiana.

Perhaps it should be noted at this juncture that my newfound joy in biking was not accompanied by unnecessary restrictions such as dieting or moderation in drinking.

After all, the whole point in riding hard during the day was justifying massive meals and fine ale at night. Thus acknowledged, couscous proved to be ideally suited for an exercise regimen like ours. The tiny rice-like granules are in fact pasta; grilled sausages and skewered meats accompany the rich vegetable-based sauce, all of it uniquely spiced and smothered with fiery harissa sauce. Chickpeas and pine nuts appear alongside raisins and dates.

The red wine? Also memorable, and proof of our versatility.

Finally returned to the hotel and sated, with a final round of ales safely beneath our belts, we slept well.

Saturday would be the highlight of the Tournai segment of the trip. There'd be a ride to and from the monthly brewing day at Brasserie à Vapeur (the steam-operated brewery), followed by televised Eurocup soccer in Tournai, then a special meal of lobster at the La Cave à Bière, and best of all, the delightful company of three dear friends from Denmark: Kim Andersen, Kim Wiesener, and Allan Gamborg. They were in Belgium for the Eurocup, and had booked rooms at the a’Alcantara to meet us for one evening’s dining and drinking.

Next: Would the novice beercycling team survive these rigors?

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*  It appears that a brewpub exists there today.

** There seem to be no on-line references to La Cave à Bière since around 2013, which suggests that it's no longer in business.

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The PC: Beercycling with Le Tour.

The PC: Beercycling with Le Tour.

A weekly web column by Roger A. Baylor.

American clocks do not synchronize with Europe, and so each year that I remain stateside during the Tour de France, I must adapt with breakfast buffets of espresso, baguettes, gnarly goat cheese … and beer.

I’ve seen brief snippets of Le Tour in person on two occasions, in 2001 and 2004. Oddly, both glimpses came not in France, but in Belgium. The first viewing was in Lo, a very small town, and the second came in Liege, a very large city. Rural or cosmopolitan, the vibrations were identical, and it’s a thrill to be in proximity to the festive atmosphere surrounding the Tour, watching people of all ages gather to witness what can be the most fleeting of sporting seconds.

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But first, an obligatory word from the Tour’s sponsors, namely, the mechanized entourage preceding the cyclists’ arrival, equal parts dromedary and circus sideshow. In Lo, we got to see it all.

Support vans for the various teams roll through at intervals, and there is no mistaking which corporation pays their freight. Dozens of vehicles in all shapes and sizes belonging to various subsidiary sponsors dart past, leaving mounds of advertising paraphernalia strewn in their wake. When this colorful parade is over, there is a pause before sirens blast, bells toll, policemen noisily clear the street, and the actual cyclists finally make their appearances.

When riding on flat ground, the peloton can go past so incredibly quickly that if you yawn, you’ll miss it. Once past, enterprising spectators then rush back to their cars (or bikes) to take pursuit, and perhaps choose another vantage point further down the road.

But in Lo, it struck me that residents of villages not graced with the Tour’s presence for many decades take a far more leisurely opportunity to make a day of it, first introducing their children and grandchildren to the event’s history, and then watching the pedal-by before returning to their homes for cocktail hour and the evening news.

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Having taken up walking, I’ve done little in 2014 to merit the description of bicyclist, but still consider myself a lapsed, casual, commuting cyclist. My riding resumed in the late 1990’s after a long hiatus, beginning with a mountain bike for short jaunts only, then graduating to a hybrid – a heavier frame and wider tires.

I still have the bike. Except for the original frame, every bit of it has been replaced numerous times with replacement components. It has traveled with me to Europe on at least four occasions for the pursuit of beercycling, or the discriminating art of doing just enough riding to justify the beers (and meals) that come afterward.

It is inexcusable hedonism at its finest, though not without informative sightseeing, hearty exercise and enriching camaraderie. If you can bike past a Belgian frites stand without stopping, you’re a better – and thinner – man.

In beercycling, one experiences the cityscape and countryside, just not at speeds customarily traveled by Tour de France riders. I weigh more than them, and they climb mountains like the Pyrenees faster than I traverse the neutral terrain of Flanders. Their support teams are not at my disposal, although in the early days of the race, riders were compelled to carry everything they needed to make necessary repairs.

And, much as now, the Tour de France’s cyclists used to seek the assistance of performance enhancing substances. A poster on the wall at the Public House shows 1920’s era Tour participants on break, seated on the steps of a café, with admiring children clustered behind them watching intently as they hoisted big mugs of beer.

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A few years ago, I read “Tour de France: The History, The Legend, The Riders,” by Graeme Fife.

Fife, an English amateur cyclist, provides a workably chronological, if sometimes meandering, account of the race’s century-long history, as well as gritty descriptions of his own two-wheeled gonzo ascents of the particularly gruesome climbs expected of riders each year in the Alps and Pyrenees.

These climbs provide instruction as to why drugs of all conceivable types have always been taboo, as well as (arguably) indispensable elements of the Tour. Before the fame and riches, there came a race designed by its founder to be a superlative, supreme test in the annals of human endurance, something otherwise found only within the pages of a US Marine Corps training manual.

In fact, early Tour routes were calculated, lengthened, augmented and toughened according to their prime mover’s earnest (warped?) desire for the “perfect” Tour as one so abominably difficult that only a single rider would survive each year to approach the stand and claim victory.

Perhaps this is why I feel about the Tour de France much as I do about American baseball: Some sportsmen may well be cheating dopers, and I’ll waste no time defending their actions, preferring to gaze benignly past the ephemeral, toward the timeless and true essence of the sport itself, this being what matters the most to me.

Accordingly, my personal Tour de France moment was in 2006 in the Czech Republic. In one grueling day, my compatriot Kevin Richards and I rode roughly 125 late summer kilometers through ceaselessly hilly, gorgeous Bohemian countryside, fully laden with panniers, stopping exhausted just before dusk at a three-word, multi-syllabic town, renting a room, showering, and finally dining on beer, wine, duck, beef and more beer. These are the drugs of choice for the discerning beercyclist.

Vive la France! … and, long live Ceska Republika, too.

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In 2001, the Lo year, we beercyclists made the newspaper in Poperinge. As translated by the inimitable Luc Dequidt, here is the article.

Did we really say that about Lance Armstrong? Maybe it was the beer talking.

4 Americans visit the Tour - Beer and Cycling

Four Americans stayed this week at the Palace Hotel in Poperinge - Bob Reed and Kevin Lowber from Kentucky, Tim Eads and Roger Baylor from Indiana. Mainly here to sample local brews, they did not want to miss the Tour de France; they watched it from the terrace of a local pub in Lo, a more than unique experience for the four Americans.

Kentucky is mainly known for breeding horses, so horse racing is extremely popular. Indiana is more industrialized with steel industry around Lake Michigan. Needless to say that they were charmed by the peace and quiet of the Poperinge area, a cyclist's paradise. Their home states are more car orientated.

On Monday they cycled to Lo; they had never seen the Tour or any other main cycling event. American TV pays more attention to extreme sports, cycling is not one of them despite the presence of Lance Armstrong. They were impressed by the publicity caravan, carnival as they called it; a Michelin flag or Champion cap made a nice souvenir. They watched out for the American cyclists; they recognized the US Postal shirts but not who rode with a blue shirt. They strongly believe in another victory of Lance Armstrong but did not hear yet about the cooperation with the controversial Italian doctor Ferrari.

They do not speak in public about drugs. "Armstrong seems to be an honest guy." They would be very disappointed when it would appear that their hero in the Tour takes illegal products.

They do not know many names of Belgian cyclists, exception made for Tom Steels and Eddy Merckx, of course. After the Tour passed through Lo, Westvleteren was the next stop for a delicious Trappist.

Roger, Tim, Kevin and Bob already visited Poperinge in 1999 during the hop fest. Bob remembers the refreshing taste of Hommelbier and still speaks highly about the Hop Queen.

Again local real ales are the reason for staying at the Palace. Landlord Guy serves them another brew each evening in a matching glass; no less than 130 different beers are available at the Palace.

Before leaving Poperinge, they cycled up the Cassel-mountain and visited a local inn, het Kasteelhof, where another local ale was tasted.

As a salesman, Kevin introduced the Hommelbier in quite a number of American pubs and also Roger serves it in his Rich O's Public House. He will soon serve his own homebrew.

This column contains bits from previous writings on the topic.

A new column at LouisvilleBeer.com: "The devil’s in the Wien tale."

I really wouldn't mind being back there right about now.

The devil’s in the Wien tale

Posted by Roger Baylor in Baylor on Beer | 0 comments

When it comes to preaching the gospel of real beer, the truth can be revealed to you in the unlikeliest of places … and by the least expected of messengers.

Back in 2006, my hardy band of beer cyclists gathered our spare tubes, route maps and brewery addresses in preparation for an epic assault on Central Europe. Once on continental ground, our strenuous two-wheeled rides were strategically interspersed with drinking bouts and hangover-day rail transfers as we moved steadily east from Bamberg to Prague, where on the south side of the city, a 170-mile sign-posted Greenway path to Vienna originates. Indeed, the Austrian capital was our ultimate goal.

"From Cassel to New Albany," at LouisvilleBeer.com

My latest column is up at LouisvilleBeer.com ... remember that these appear twice monthly, and thanks for reading.

From Cassel to New Albany

Three of us were struggling up a fairly steep incline, our creaking rental bicycles squeaking and straining over ascending cobblestones. As a proponent of the manly cycling virtues, I found it impossible to admit that I lacked both gears and legs, and kept churning forward, but at some point I glanced backward and saw that my pal Tim Eads had given up the ghost...

Menu for the Louis Le Français beer dinner on Thursday, March 1.

"Mug Shots" today in LEO: "The cycle of life."

It's a very "Short History of Restorative Beers." I've also contributed an interview with the man who's bringing Falls City back from the grave, which I'm told will be used in the annual bar issue.

Mug Shots: The cycle of life

In the small town of Frasnes-lez-Buissenal, within the gently hilly area of Belgium known as the Pays du Collines, there is a municipal health and fitness center not unlike the YMCA, save for one crucial difference.

Planning underway for the 2008 Belgian/Dutch beercycling adventure in September.

Most readers are aware that the brew tour planned for the Pacific Northwest in May was cancelled owing to insufficient numbers. Resources now are being directed toward September, when we'll undertake a Belgian/Dutch beercycling adventure.

TRIP OVERVIEW

Know that the projected excursion is being organized primarily for the benefit of those planning on actively beercycling, with other possibilities incorporated as practicable for those who aren’t.

The idea this time is to rent bikes, not take our own, and to have them transported separately to our staging area near Poperinge. We’ll travel by train from Amsterdam/Haarlem to Poperinge, stopping for two or three brewery tours along the way, begin the biking segment on the weekend of the triennial hop festival, then cycle back to Haarlem for concluding festivities.

If there is enough interest in renting a vehicle to serve as “sag wagon,” then we’ll do that, too.

WHEN WILL IT BE?

The tentative schedule looks like this, and is subject to constant revision.

Tue. Sept. 16
Outbound Louisville to Amsterdam (overnight)

Wed. Sept. 17
Arrive Amsterdam a.m., transfer to rooms in Amsterdam (or Haarlem)

Thur. Sept. 18
Train to Mechelen (Belgium) for the Anker (Gouden Carolus) brewery tour and overnight stay at the brewery hotel if possible.

Fri. Sept. 19
Train to Ingelmunster, brewery tour at Van Honsebrouck (Kasteel brands) and maybe the Pico Brouwerij Alvinne, and overnight in Ingelmunster and/or environs.

Sat. Sept. 20
Train to Poperinge, Ieper or environs to meet the bicycles at the pre-designated lodging. Hopefully, a bike ride to France and a visit to the great beer bar atop the hill at Cassel.

Sun. Sept. 21
Parade and hop festival in Poperinge.

Mon. Sept. 22
Leave the vicinity of Poperinge and ride to Brugge; evening at Brugs Beertje.

Tue. Sept. 23
A second day in Brugge so as to make the rounds of friends and good beer bars.

Wed. Sept. 24
Bike to Middelburg (Netherlands) and an evening at “The Mug” beer bar & restaurant.

Thur. Sept. 25, Fri. Sept. 26
Make our way north toward Haarlem.

Sat Sept. 27
Arrive in Haarlem and have a party with our friends there.

Sun. Sept. 28
Official tour end. Your option as to what to do next.

AIRFARE

Flights are your responsibility, and I’ll be going in/out of Amsterdam, but I can make suggestions if need be or try to book as many of us as possible on the same flights if you wish. For flights, I work through Bliss Travel in New Albany.

WHAT WILL IT COST?

Don’t kid yourselves about costs. They will be high. When all is said and done, I can’t imagine 12-14 days costing any less than $4,000, and maybe more.

ARE YOU PLANNING ON GOING?

If any part of this is of interest, please let me know by responding to basic questions:

A. Yes, I’ll be renting a bike and riding.

B. Yes, but I’d rather ride in the sag wagon, understanding that seating may be limited.

C. Yes, but I’m going to travel by train and coincide with the group whenever possible.

D. Yes, but I have special needs/specific dates/etc.

Thanks, and I hope to see some of you there.

Weekend musing.

My first trip to Europe came in 1985, and for 15 years afterward, the bicycle was conspicuously absent as a preferred mode of transportation while visiting the continent.

This changed in 2000, and since then, it’s hard to imagine being in Europe and not riding a bike for at least some portion of the time. The notions of biking across the countryside and drinking great beer while doing it have become almost inseparable, and it becomes increasingly difficult to consider one without the other.

It’s been a year since the last trip, and it will be a year until the next one. In the interim, much of the beercycling I do will have to be local, and that’s a better prospect than ever before given the proximity of downtown New Albany establishments offering good beer.

The problem with beercycling in this fashion is that I must be forced to take the long ride first, instead of cycling less than a mile from my house and commencing happy hour without the rationale of it being a restorative.

The other problems in 2007 have been the necessity of rotator cuff repair surgery, a very good business year that has required more work hours than expected, a steadily escalating ambition to expand the business, and my continued involvement in civic affairs. My wife Diana has been working and attending graduate school simultaneously, and in some ways, it feels like I’ve been doing the same.

Biking time has lagged accordingly, although I’m still trying to use the bike as a means of commuting whenever possible. But, there’s plenty of time to prepare for the anticipated fall adventure in 2008, when we’ll be attending the triennial hop festival in Poperinge. Belgium. We hope this will be convergence in two columns, by bike and vehicle, and it has already become the most challenging logistical puzzle that I’ve attempted to solve during the course of my travels.

Getting from Budapest to Moscow in 1987 as an independent rail traveler seeking a student-priced ducat was a piece of cake compared to this, but when it comes right down to it, I’m stubborn that way, and it’ll work out in the end.

Once the journey is underway, it will become transformed as it always does, into a time to be remembered and cherished. I’ve been exceedingly fortunate, and tremendous travel memories abound. We need to make some more. I’ll keep you posted.

Belgian beercycling 2000: Belgian beercycling 2000: The final beercycle ride, and postscripts.

Kevin Richards, Bob Reed, Buddy Sandbach, Kevin Lowber and Roger Baylor somehow survived the rampant hospitality at Huyghe, maker of Delirium Tremens, and on Friday set off on a final ride before the 2000 beercycling trip drew to a close.

8. Belgian beercycling 2000: Brugge and the DTs.

7. Belgian beercycling 2000: A pause for perspective before the tour concludes.

6. Belgian beercycling 2000: Poperinge and Cassel.

5. Belgian beercycling 2000: An evening at Cave a Biere, Danes included.

4. Belgian beercycling 2000: Brewing day with Jean-Louis at Brasserie A Vapeur.

3. Belgian beercycling 2000: Tournai warm-up, Cave a Bieres and Pays du Collines.

2. Belgian beercycling 2000: From Brussels to the Tournai base camp in less than 15 drinks.

1. Belgian beercycling 2000: A prologue.

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It was the year 2000, the anticipated Euro currency conversion was around the corner but had yet to occur, and for a final day of rental beercycling on a sunny Friday in Brugge, we chose to spend a few spare guilders in the Netherlands.

At first glance, it may seem that the Netherlands is too far away form the Belgium to make for a comfortable day trip, and in fact much of it is, but a non-contiguous slice of Dutch territory lies on the south side of the waterway known as the Westerschelde, or the mouth of the Schelde River as it leaves Antwerp for the ocean. This bit of the Netherlands is easily accessible by bicycle paths aimed east and north from Brugge, passing through the popular tourist village of Damme, along idyllic tree lined canals and through manure-caked working farms reminiscent of Breughel paintings.

Certainly it was the easiest of the trip’s rides, both because we’d developed legs (and posteriors) strong enough to navigate for longer periods of time, and owing to the perfectly flat nature of the terrain in the northernmost extent of Flanders. Hills and grades are almost non-existent, and the route is strewn with signs and so impeccably marked that we briefly became lost, anyway, perhaps stemming from the biggest impediment to progress during the ride: Too much DT on the Huyghe brewery tour the previous day, and too many post-tour restoratives at the famed t’Brugs Beertje specialty beer café upon our Thursday evening return to Brugge.

At a particularly confusing crossroads, a tractor-borne native pointed straight, and within minutes we were standing outside a café in the Dutch town of Sluis, and I was extracting a handful of colorful leftover guilders from a previous visit to the Netherlands in 1998 in preparation for the best we could do under the circumstances, a round of Heinekens and nibbles for all.

Since the food included herring, my day was complete.

After lunch, the ride continued to the northwest. For all of us, it was a first opportunity to experience the fabled infrastructure available to cyclists in the Netherlands. Paved paths follow alongside all roads, and clearly delineated lanes guide cyclists through urban areas. Sometimes there are intersections for cyclists that shadow the automotive ones yards away, and complete with their own sets of stop lights.

Soon we were back in Belgium, skirting just south of Knokke-Heist on the coast, and coming to the second objective: The sea and a convenient beach at Zeebrugge for a few minutes of sand and sea spray before turning due south along an industrialized canal for the ride back into Brugge and a second consecutive evening at the Beertje.

There would be a third, at the end of the full Saturday remaining to us, but the shared consensus was that the first-time visitors in the group were intent on sightseeing and shopping in the lovely if tourist-laden city of Brugge, so the rental bikes were returned and the cycling segment of the 2000 beercycling fact-finding mission concluded.

Except for Kevin Lowber, who had met us in Poperinge, the group had put in roughly 125 miles altogether, with perhaps half of that coming in two rides (Cassel and Sluis) near the end. In the touring years to come, there would be times when several of us approached 100 miles in a day, fully laden, but given our neophyte status in 2000, the inconsistent architecture of the rental bikes and the demands of food and drink, there was much to celebrate.

The journey was winding down. On Sunday morning, Kevin Richards, Buddy Sandbach and I boarded a train in Brugge and set out for Leuven, an old university city on the eastern side of Brussels that lies near the national airport where Kevin and Buddy would be departing Belgium for America on Monday morning. We’d booked a room in Leuven with the prospect of arriving and hopefully having enough time to attend a performance by the rock band Pearl Jam at the Werchter pop/rock festival taking place nearby, but Eddie Vedder’s group had canceled owing to tragic occurrences at another fest in Roskilde, Denmark a few days previous. Instead of concert-going, it looked instead to be a relaxed, “free” last day.

The commute from Brugge to Leuven hardly would have been noteworthy had not Buddy’s eyes (and wallet) been somewhat bigger than his luggage. He spent the afternoon and evening in Brugge frantically scrounging rare Belgian ales from various sales outlets, and broke away resolutely early from the closing ceremonies at Beertje to return to the hotel and find some way of packing them all.

There we revelers found him well after midnight, with bottles, toiletries and underwear heaped down the side of corridor, agonizing over the proper way to insure the safety of his souvenirs while flying home. Luckily, he managed to succeed in this aim, removing only a handful of bottles for ballast-lightening consumption in the process. Less fortunately, there were too few hours for sleeping, and as he realized come morning, a stupendous weight gain in baggage. It should suffice to say that splurging on a cab ride to the train station was much appreciated.

Still, even spared the burden of a cross-town walk, Buddy had three separate pieces of quite heavy luggage, and upon exiting the train in Leuven, he was not happy to discover that the station there is of archaic design, requiring the ascent of numerous steps to reach a passageway crossing over the tracks, not beneath them as is the case most of the time. With the assistance of two passers-by who evidently took pity at Buddy’s plight (or were eager to move him out of the way so they’d reach their train on time), he made it up, down, and over, collapsing into a waiting taxi for the ride to the hotel. Checked in, and with his larder thus preserved, he fell into a deep, evening long sleep.

Unable to wake him, Kevin and I explored Leuven, visited its brewpub, noted the presence of the industrial Stella Artois beer factory, mounted a hill for a look at the chateau originally belonging to Leuven’s local aristocrats, and eventually settled into handy café chairs to recap the first beercycling trip with a few final rounds of Belgian ale.

Verily, the beercycling cat had been let out of the bag, the touring genie released from the bottle, and a suitable tone set for future adventures. We’d hatched our Belgian scheme while seated at Polly’s Freeze, a local ice cream institution back in Indiana, and now, after achieving the goal, we were able to offer benedictions over Chimay and beefsteak in Leuven.

It only seemed natural to echo Bob Reed’s tip-off toast:

“Here’s to us … may we never quarrel or fuss … but if by chance we should disagree … &*^%$ you, and here’s to me!