It’s striking to me that immediately outside the cities we’ve visited there are fields and pastures, not urban sprawl.
It’s so beautiful to see green, lush rolling hills and trees bordering the city, and I imagine riding a bicycle from suburbia to downtown would be a challenge.
Different culture, different mindset.
Before heading out of Maastricht we toured the St. Pietersberg Caves, a sandstone (marl) quarry with a network of man-made tunnels. In addition to being a source for building materials, they also served as a place of refuge for residents during the many sieges which Maastricht has endured over the centuries as well as during World War II. Very interesting to see, and it’s a pity that’ it’s a closed-off attraction as we would have loved to spent hours exploring it.
We were very fortunate to have great weather this entire Labor Day weekend with mostly sunny and upper 70’s, and we had to stop and remind ourselves that today is the bookend of summer back in the U.S.
About halfway into our drive back to Ramstein, Germany we stopped for lunch in St. Vith, Belgium (population 9,169) at An Den Linden, a great little outdoor café in the heart of downtown. Our server had very good English, which we learned was because she lived in Philadelphia for a year. Her favorite spot in the U.S., besides Hawaii, was San Diego. The world is certainly getting smaller.
We arrived back ‘home’ in Ramstein well-spent, to round out our unusual breakfast in Netherlands – lunch in Belgium – dinner in Germany Labor day.
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