Cobblestones

A reader of this blog, Marianne, has wondered, what do these Belgium cobblestones look like?

I took some photos of coblestones today to answer that question. If you have been reading this blog, you may remember a few days ago when we were heading downhill and the asphalt pavement turned into cobblestones. It was all we could do to hold on tight and apply brakes to keep under control.

Below is on type of cobblestone used in the city streets. As you might guess, it would be easy to cause our skinny road bikes to bounce around, I could answer why we are riding road bikes with skinny tires in a separate blog.

 

The next style of coblestones is shown below. We encounter these more often in the rural paths and roads. As you might be able to see, the stones are more rounded on top and larger gaps between the stones. These are the style of stones that we had encountered during the downhill adventure that I had described. As the speeding bike careens down the hill, the bike is bouncing from cobblestone crown to cobblestone crown spending as much time in the air as in contact with the ground. When traveling in Belgium their expect the cobblestones. Belgium is famous for them and many other european countries have their share for them as well.

Please don't think that I'm complaining, it's part of the experience that I wouldn't trade for anything. If you are a skier, you might understand this better. Any good skiing days will include at least a couple good mogul bump runs. Good times are not found by staying on the groomed runs.

Happy Biking

Brian