Have just arrived in the Double Tree Hilton, Luxembourg City - good run down from Brussels including a new personal best, very little traffic once off the ring road and some light mist to complement the snow covered verges.
Came across on the DFDS to Dunkirk yesterday, which was smooth but fundamentally dull. An expensive return trip at £137, especially as I've done it before in the first week of January for around £40 return.
Headed straight for Ghent, arriving at dusk. The city comfortably exceeded expectations, with my impression being that, the centre at least, had all the beauty of Bruges, but actually catered to people other than tourists. There were plenty of places to eat, and good food could be had in the sub EUR 15 range.
I parked about 1km from the historic centre in a chain multi-story - was showing as having eight places when I entered, but most of the top level was empty so managed to get a place without anyone either side. Having said that, the places were at least 10 foot wide, so there would have been no issues with that anyway. I purposely chose this one as figured it would be less busy than the one at the actual centre, but up walking to the central one, it showed 100+ places free. I presume more shoppers than tourists this time of year?
Exiting the car park was rather more difficult than entering it however; the down ramps were built right next to each other, meaning the turning circle between levels was about two thirds of the length of the CL, effectively necessitating a two point turn before attempting each ramp - pretty sure I wasn't missing anything, but would be chaos when busy. Cheap at least at EUR 2.50 for three hours.
I then proceeded down to Waterloo, staying at the Ibis. Cheap, clean and free Internet that was uploading at 20+mbits/s, so points for that. I ate in the attached Italian restaurant which was serving Pizza Express / Zizzi / Prezzo style meals, but double their portion sizes. I started with a beef cannelloni and then had a truffle risotto washed down with a tap water. Totalled EUR 23, and would say they could have charged EUR 30 without the food seeming bad value. Guess the setting wasn't great however.
Waterloo as a town is dominated by light industry and car dealerships, so not a destination in its own right but the battlefield visitor centre is worth a stop, as much for the ability to survey the field and see the three farm houses from the Lion Mound.
I then did a bit of a drive round to see La Haye Sainte (can get very close, but not into it), La Belle Alliance, and Papelot, the latter being a horse riding school these days. The lanes between them were an interesting challenge, being paved with cobbles that have subsided at either edge leaving quite a raised ridge in the middle - I had the ABC at its highest setting for these, as when you combined the subsidence with a pot hole it really was rather pronounced. Quite a few deep puddles as well; could see one over the axles in the mirror. Good fun though, and the first time I'd really had to do anything like that with the CL.
From there went into Brussels and parked up with ease on the street. Took a walk through a park to the Autoworld Museum which was excellent. Highlight of the trip so far. They had a guest exhibition of Aston Martin's including some very rare early ones. There was a decent selection of Audis as well as an intriguing selection of pre-WW1 and interwar cars, especially French and Belgium marques that never reopened post '45. My only criticism would be that was minimal explanation with each one; some required no introduction, but it would have been nice with some others.
Opposite is the National Army Museum. Given this gets rave reviews I was a little disappointed in that it covered the Napoleonic and Great War eras well, but seemed to skip Congo, the Second World War, and Belgium's more recent deployments, especially as they have FN. They did however have an excellent hall dedicated to the evolution of medieval and early modern armour and edged weapons, and an exhaustive flag collection.
I then thought I would drive a little further into the centre, but this proved a lazy mistake as 90 mins later I was hopelessly stuck in heavy traffic, the OBD showing 12mpg with no chance of turning left as inevitably required. Sharing the road with trams is also surprisingly stressful at times! Anyway, I gave that up as a bad job and continued on to Lux, frustratingly not quite having the range to cross the border before refuelling, but am back on the orange light now so will fill here tomorrow. 98 is below 1 EUR per litre here, compared to EUR 1.40 in Belgium.
The attached restaurant was offering a 'special' NYE cold buffet for EUR 55, which I politely declined, and now have a beef tartar, weiner schnitzel, fries and salad being sent up for 28 EUR - much more like it! Would defo recommend the Double Tree for anyone saying in Lux - pleasant woodland setting, spotlessly clean, and even the basic room is what I would describe as a junior suite.
Day 1 saw a reported 24.5 mpg at an average speed of 54.
Today saw 20 mpg with an average speed of 41, which I though was excellent recovery considering I was down at 12 mpg and 16 mph at one point.
The CL has performed excellently throughout on pretty much every surface and traffic condition going. I do wonder the drivers side windows aren't 100% aligned or if there's an issue with the rubber trim (nothing visible on a casual inspection), as wind whistle at speed is disappointing, and I'm sure a non-pillarless S class wouldn't suffer the same noise.
Am just waiting for pictures to upload and will then add in a few links.
