‘M off - Eifel, Luxembourg and Belgium

[Redboots]

These post are quite advanced compared to those that I grew up with.
You are correct though today about the road number identifier.

The 5.1 will be the kilometre marker*, meaning that every posts is placed at every 0.1km or a 100m. I suppose this would help emergency services as well as you to identify let say your breakdown or worse accident location. The 73* just after 5.1 is strongly suspect, is the total distance of the road that is L106. The triangle or arrow is the direction of the countdown meaning that in 5.1km you shall be arriving at the end of the L106 which will start in the town or a junction ahead of you, on the river bank.

You may have picked up on the fact that the post is only so tall around 0.8-1m in height, and that it has two types of reflector on it. The reflectors are for guidance in the dark, heavy snowfall or indeed a flood as per recent event in May of this year and to help you identify where the edge of the road is.
I haven’t looked it up, but to my untrained eye, the vertical reflector is basically telling me to follow the road (think of it as an arrow) and that you are on a correct side of the road, the two dot reflectors on the other side, are those representing a pair of headlight of the oncoming traffic.

Growing up in Lithuania, this type of road marker has arrived in the country a few years after the fall of USSR. They did however, only have a white, amber and red reflectors on them.

*73km equites to 73000m, or 7300 posts a side meaning 14600 post in total on just on that stretch of the 73km long road.

**It is not to different to motorway markers here in the UK. Which I doubt even half the population*** know what they are, where to locate them or indeed how to use them. What does A and B mean for example on the M25. Meaning that when they are calling through for help from the side of the motorway, and asked for their location they just shout down the phone that they are somwhere near an old oak tree and a church in the distance

***unless one is a professional driver such as trucker, emergency vehicle driver etc.

Road signs are there for a reason, it is just a shame that majority of people haven’t a clue what they mean or simply ignorant and not interested to know. Knowing what is happening on TikTok or some suck entertainment outlet is way more important unfortunately.

Ev, I bet you're fun at a party

 

[EVskiy]

I eventually reached the river’s edge at Alf, where there was some sort of junk fair going on, with people selling all sort of ‘useful’ tat:

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I was particularly taken with someone selling water skis, alongside other stuff:

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I would guess that the the market was over 100 yards long. I can only assume the vendors get their pleasure carting the stuff around, as (less than a mile or so down the road) there was another market selling exactly the same old crap.

Flohmarkt is a national sport in Germany. Not to dissimilar to a car boot sale over here in Britain.
My first ever mobile phone (Nokia 5110) was a bargain from such a place in a year 2002. The fecking thing wouldn’t die despite me playing snake game on it for absolutely ages on it. I was like a kid* with a new toy**

When I worked as bicycle technician in Hamburg. My then boss would be heading out in his van in the small hours of the morning to take up bargains that were somebody’s junky old bicycles. He’d have them fixed up, by me and his son and flog them for a decent profit.
There is gold to be found amongst the piles of shit and some people are rather good at it.

*/** both are true facts.

 

[EVskiy]

I

Ev, I bet you're fun at a party

I sure can be. But when not I just grab my coat.

I have my uses.

 

[Tinytim]

These post are quite advanced compared to those that I grew up with.
You are correct though today about the road number identifier.

The 5.1 will be the kilometre marker*, meaning that post is placed at every 0.1km or a 100m. I suppose this would help emergency services as well as you to identify let say your breakdown or worse accident location.
The 73* just after 5.1 I strongly suspect, is the total distance of the road that is L106.
The triangle or arrow is the direction of the countdown, meaning that in 5.1km you shall be arriving at the end of the L106 which will start/end in the town or at a junction ahead of you, on the river bank.

You may have picked up on the fact that the post is only so tall around 0.8-1m in height, and that it has two types of reflector on it. The reflectors are for guidance in the dark, heavy snowfall or indeed a flood as per recent events in May of this year and to help you identify where the edge of the road is.
I haven’t looked it up, but to my untrained eye, the vertical reflector is basically telling me to follow the road (think of it as an arrow) and that you are on a correct side of the road, the two dot reflectors on the other side, are those representing a pair of headlight of the oncoming traffic.

Growing up in Lithuania, this type of road marker has arrived in the country a few years after the fall of USSR. They did however, only have a white, amber and red reflectors on them.

*73km equites to 73000m, or 7300 posts a side meaning 14600 post in total on just on that stretch of the 73km long road.

**It is not to different to motorway markers here in the UK. Which I doubt even half the population*** know what they are, where to locate them or indeed how to use them. What does A and B mean for example on the M25. Meaning that when they are calling through for help from the side of the motorway, and asked for their location they just shout down the phone that they are somwhere near an old oak tree and a church in the distance

***unless one is a professional driver such as trucker, emergency vehicle driver etc.

Road signs are there for a reason, it is just a shame that majority of people haven’t a clue what they mean or simply ignorant and not interested to know. Knowing what is happening on TikTok or some such entertainment outlet is way more important unfortunately.

Are you on the blob ?

 

[EVskiy]

Are you on the blob ?

Huh?

 

[Wapping]

Day four…. Continued…..

I left the tat stalls of Alf behind and continued my stately procession along the Mosel, in the general direction of Traben-Trarbach, for lunch. This brought me past the vineyards on the steep (precipitous, even) river banks. I see that bods seem to sponsor indifual rows, or name them for some personal celebrations:





The car park I usually use, was devoted to a funfair, so I parked out of the way, just off the main road:



Lunch was in a small restaurant which, Google tells me, used to be the town jail:







After my lunch, I sauntered back to my bike:







Continuing along the river, before turning up into the heights again, where big gaps demand big bridges:



And big views:



Along with warnings:

 

[Wapping]

The rest of the afternoon’s ride back to the hotel, was mostly devoted to increasingly failing attempts to get my BMW Connected app thing to work.

The only thing really of any note was a small German WW2 cemetery that I chanced upon in Holsthum:



Looking at the dates for most of the graves, I should imagine that many of the fallen, met their end in the doomed Ardennes’ offensive at the end of 1944. German war graves are very different in style than our own, being commemorated in dark stone, as opposed to the British / Commonwealth war graves, which are much lighter. Styling differences aside, the war graves commissions from both sides, do maintain them well. No judgement fell on the losing side, when it came to respectful burials, though of course millions that fell on the Easter Front and / or in Siberia as POWs for years after, have no grave at all.

From there it was a straightforward run back to the hotel.

 

[Wapping]

Day five….. The longest of my days out from my hotel in Winterspelt



The day dawned, bright and sunny:



Breakfast over, it was out of the door:




The stuff lurking under the fruit in the centre is Quark, apparently:




First reference point, on what is a jaunt through three countries, is the Belgium border:



As the border follows the river Our as it meanders along, you end up crossing backward and forwards between Germany, Belgium and Germany again. Here is me crossing back into Germany at the small village of Stoubach, in the middle of nowhere:



The river really is pretty small:



According to the notice board blurb, the route is on some sort of cultural sculptures thing:



And, naturally enough, healthy hiking takes it’s part, too:



Just over the bridge, on the German side, is what seems to be a quite decent hotel, where I stopped for a coffee:

 

[Wapping]

My next stop of any significance was in Wiltz (Luxembourg) somewhere where I always manage to get lost on the winding roads of the town at the top of the hill:







From Wiltz, it was on to Ettelbruck, Luxembourg, with only a pause to take in a view stop:



I should add that the local council hedge trimmers need to make themselves busy, as I had to stand on the bench to see over the hedge.

Some people like Ettelbruck; I can’t say that I have ever stayed there, always seeing it as not the greatest place in Luxembourg. My view reconfirmed, it was time to turn for ‘home’ again, with just a mid-afternoon ice cream stop in Stolzembourg, just inside Luxembourg, again on the Our river border:





The village had a passably interesting Information’ board:



From Stolzembourg, it was just a matter of winding my way back into Germany:



It being Sunday, the my hotel’s restaurant was shut. Google though had found me a pretty good Italian restaurant, not far away, in Pronsfeld:





Scran scroffed, washed down with a couple of beers, it was then just a short 12 km hop on the motorway to Winterspelt and my hotel.

 

[Wapping]

Day seven…



This was a different jaunt from those previous, in as much as it headed away from the hilly / wooded / hair pinned parts nto the generally flatter region.

Encouragingly, the day started (and ended) bright and hot, getting up to 30C by mid-afternoon:





I took a short break in Stadtkyll, just to have a look at the newly redecorated church, along with the blessing on my ‘Wander’:



The churchyard (I’d guess you’d call it) had quite a clever bench, to charge your mobile phone, powered by solar panels:



The religious sculpture, had four friezes, depicting biblical stories, of which I could work out some:

Mary and Joseph’s journey to Bethlehem:



The three shepherds and the star:



Possibly, the loaves and fishes?



Maybe the last supper? Though they don’t seem to be sitting at a long table. I guess it’s just parrables?



Anyway, having received the blessing of the Lord:



And goggled at the town’s maypole:



It was off in the direction of Adenau, for a coffee stop.

To be continued….

 

[Doc]

Nice. Weather looks too have been ok for you.
A few way points on that route Richard. Just had a look on MRA

 

[Wapping]

The weather has been excellent, thank you, a lot better than was forecast, the day I left London. It’s hard now to imagine that parts were badly flooded just a couple of weeks ago.The warm, wet summer means that everything is still very green. I have been in the Eifel before, when it has been burnt brown.

MyRoute recommends a shaping point, every thee miles or so. I follow that recommendation.

 

[Arsey]

Day six….

Frieze, motherfucker……


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….

Fixed

 

[Wapping]

Adenau, relies on its closeness and relationship to the nearby Nürburgring:







I parked my bike, dumped my jacket, transferred and then withdrew some cash and went for a wander about:







Having no clear idea as to where I’d have lunch, I picked up a cheese roll in quite a good bakery, to eat on the hoof layer:

 

[Arsey]

Love sitting in Adenau having a beer at the Blaue Ecke and watching the various GT3RSs etc burble past.

 

[Wapping]

Lunch bought, I was off again.

In Germany, if you wander about long enough, you are bound to come across some impediment to your smooth onwards passage:





The dreaded U navigated around and with the temperature rising, I stopped to eat my roll in a picnic spot:







Before heading south again…



And another U. I guess those roads don’t mend themselves…



The detour was quite a long way but I worked my way back on route at Losheim, where the northern arm of the German army group retreated back through, after the Ardennes offensive had failed.

From there, it was down into Luxembourg, past the memorial to the two Lancaster bombers, shot down in the winter of 1944. Unfortunately, two Dutch arses (flying a drone) couldn’t be arsed to park their car properly:

 

[Wapping]

The same, very rural spot, also commemorates the vital actions of the Americans:





From there, it was then just a matter of wending my way back to Winterspelt. Day over.

 

[Wapping]

Day seven….

My last full day in the Eifel, before heading westwards again to Chimay….

 

[Micky]

Great photographs and information Wappers .... thanks

 

[Tinytim]

Excellent