Day 17 Friday, April 26th Dover to Nieuwpoort, Belgium

 We were slowly approaching Dover when we woke up earlier today.  There was quite a lot still to do before disembarking at about 0930.  We completed the final packing - we had to be out of our cabin by 0800.  We then breakfasted and said our fond farewells to the restaurant staff (they had really looked after us).  We now had some time to relax and went to watch the mooring up process.  There were three young female crew members on the front of the Maud doing an outstanding job directing operations with the Dover dock crew.  We returned and waited until our group was called for getting off the boat and were very pleased to see our very good friends Ruth and Ian waiting for us in the reception area.

After our greetings we loaded their car and we were soon underway towards the channel tunnel.  It was not too far and as we arrived earlier than they had booked we successfully arranged to go on an earlier shuttle.  Ruth had brought some refreshments which we enjoyed whilst we were sitting going through the tunnel and soon we arrived in France.  Our destination was a hotel near Ostend in 

Veurne market place

Veurne church interior

Veurne church interior

Belgium but their daughter Michelle had suggested 

Veurne market square

having a break at a town called Veurne which was enroute.  We had a quick look round the market town including its marvellous parish church and market square.  All very picturesque and full of many character buildings.  We stopped at a patisserie on the way back to the car.

It was now time to continue the journey and we drove to our hotel in Nieuwpoort (which Ian and Ruth had previously visited).  The hotel was excellent and we soon settled in.  After sorting ourselves out we met later to go for a walk to a restaurant for our evening meal.  The walk proved longer than remembered and so we took a tram the final yards to the restaurant area.  We found somewhere with vacancies and enjoyed our meal before taking the tram for the whole return journey.  It was really good to see Ian and Ruth again and there was much catching up going on.  On getting back to the hotel we were feeling really tired after the long day and soon retired to bed.