HIGH FENS COUPLES WALK, 1 JUNE 2008

High Fens Couples Walk, Sunday 1 June 2008

This will be a full day out. Allowing 1½ to 2 hours for the drive, the timetable should be as follows:
09.00 Set off from Brussels to Baraque Michel (see directions below)
11.00 walk departs from Baraque Michel 12.30 lunch at Signal de Botrange
14.00 walk back (by different route) 15.30 walk finishes.
17.30 Everybody should be home.

Travel directions (about 150 kilometres each way)
Drive east from Brussels on the E 40 motorway, direction Leuven, Liege.
After junction 31 come to Liege by-pass, with several confusing junctions.
Take care to remain on E40, direction Aachen.
After about 130 kilometres reach junction 38, signpost Eupen.
Leave motorway, turn right towards Eupen.
Drive 3 or 4 kilometres on N 67 through busy commercial area towards the city.
(this is a German speaking area, note the publicity in German as well as French).
At a big T junction (roundabout) turn right (west) on N 61, direction Verviers, Liege.
Immediately turn left (traffic lights and several small direction signs to KMILE-IRMEP etcetera),
drive south on a small link road,
Go straight across at small roundabout, curve gently upwards to right then left.
At junction, go straight forward down a steep hill.
At bottom of hill reach large roundabout next to church, opposite Ambassador Hotel.
Turn right, across bridge, on N68, direction Malmédy.
Steadily uphill for 12 kilometres to go past a road junction with N672 (for Verviers).
Two more kilometres to Baraque Michel (signpost and tavern), gather in the big car park on left.

You are now at 672 metres above sea level, in the heart of the national park.
The Hautes Fagnes (High Fens) make up a spectacular area of wild, open moorland, now heavily protected for the sake of its unique vegetation.
The climate tends to be cold, wet and windy, with snow in winter, but it can also be very clear with long-distance views across towards Germany.
You will find peat bog and rough grassland, surrounded by huge forests, and scattered lumps of quartzite rock dating back up to 500 million years, for this is geologically ancient country.
There is a good deal of history, because this is also frontier country. The Romans built roads here. There were medieval tracks, some used to carry copper from Germany to the west. The dukes of Limbourg, Luxembourg, the prince bishops of Liege and the abbots of Stavelot-Malmédy all fixed their boundaries here. Later it became the frontier between Belgium and the kingdom of Prussia, and you will see boundary posts marked B on one side and P on the other.
The whole area finally passed to Belgium under the Treaty of Versailles in 1919.

The walk will go for four kilometres along the edge of the Fagne Wallonne to the Signal de Botrange, the highest point in Belgium at 694 metres. Here we pause at the big tavern for food and drink. A monument exists for those who wish to climb up to 700 metres!
The slightly shorter return passes through the forest and then the Fagne de la Polleur, with an educational path showing where forest dwellers dug out peat for their fires until the 1960s

The walking is on mostly good paths and duckboards, but we will find some mud. Wear boots
As a high-level walk it can be windy, so bring hats and anoraks.
It is a long drive so please make your own arrangements for car-pooling.
Lunch menu offers omelettes, croques, salads, plates of Ardenne ham, and local beer.
For a different and attractive return journey, follow the main road to Malmédy, then direction Stavelot, pick up the E42 motorway, direction Verviers, Liege, Brussels.
We need exact numbers to reserve a table, so can you please reply to me by Monday 19 May.

Sheila