"Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass...It's about learning to dance in the rain." - Vivian Greene

After unbelievable three weeks of sun the rain and cold has returned to Flanders.
The rain doesn't bother me much, mostly then, even though sometimes it comes at inconvenient times.
Like today we got rained on several different times.
How thoughtful to pack Maarten's raingear!


Despite of the heavy rain that caught us right at the beach Maarten insisted to build a sandcastle. Why would he otherwise carry his bucket and spade all the way?! One is obliged to fulfill his promise, so he built a sandcastle in a record time as we were rushing him away from the grey, windy and very wet beach.

As we all know the Belgian weather is notoriously changeable, therefore a beach-only trip can be a real bummer, especially in this time of the year.

I wasn’t very excited to go to the coast, not only because of the bad weather forecast.
I don't mean to be rude to anyone reading this, but for me I would just skip visiting the Belgian seaside. I wouldn't bother with such un urbanized area with beaches mostly surrounded by ugly high-rise apartment buildings.

Luckily there is some nature left, such as the sand dunes south of De Panne near the French-Belgian border.

In this very south-western part of Belgium, so called Westhoek, you can still enjoy a hike on the peaceful dunes in the nature reserve, and even see some wildlife.




I didn’t have much time to admire the blooming wild hyacinths in the adjacent Calmeynbos as the sky opened up again.
This time we were lucky being just yards from our car.