After a very quiet night canalside, we woke to a very sunny morning and the sound of a leaf-blowing machine. Enthused by the lovely weather we thought we’d head out as soon as we were ready and stop for a morning croissant and coffee en route.

We enjoyed the perfect touring conditions of bright sunlight and gorgeous countryside colours, and headed in a roughly North-Easterly direction and after a couple of “centre ville” drive throughs reached my objective of Fort Leveau in Feignies, which was a must see from my WW1 centenary guide.

The fort was built by the French in the 19th Century for defensive reasons, but early on in WW1 it was occupied by the Germans, and they held it pretty much to the end of that War. Not surprisingly, it was very similar in WW2.

After a walk around the fort, we had a coffee break and then headed off. I’d incorrectly anticipated that we’d be arriving here later in the day, but when I’d realised how little time it had taken and then could see that Mons across the border in Belgium was equally as close I decided to head there.

I had a plan to park near to Mons and then stroll in to visit the city. However, with our usual “centre ville” approach we’d actually found ourselves driving through the Grande Place anyway, and actually negotiating our way around the incongruous funfair that had taken up residence there.

Ignoring the fair, it was a very attractive city centre and we thought we’d try and have a walk around. We actually found a roadside parking space before too long, which can often be a challenge in a motorhome. What’s more, the parking meter was out of action and there was an instruction on it to use our parking disc instead. Result. We only saved a couple of euros, but this was soon spent on two waffles, which Sophie said was OK because it was “street food”, and therefore and an acceptable food type.

Had we arrived an hour or so earlier, I think we’d have been tempted by the moules and frites, and for me a Belgian beer.