Thursday, March 09, 2023

Return to my deloved Bois de Halle

I love cities that have forests nearby

So one of the big exitements about getting back to Brussels was to get back to my favourites forests! Last weekend, despite near freezing temperatures and ice cold wind, we went back to the Bois de Halle/ Hallerbos.

It's a special forest to me because of all the trail rides that I've done there. The stable I went riding for many years between 2002-2010 (or something like that) was just a stone throw away. 

I was just reading about it, the total area of the forest now amounts to 542 ha, so that's a lot of land to get lost in! My advantage on the horse back was always that horsies wanted to go home, so if ever I felt uncertain about turning left or right, I would be sure that the horse would take the shortest and smartest decision (they are like living GPS!). 

This time we had to use the map on a mobile at one point, we felt a bit turned around with all trails looking alike and pointing to 5 different directions. As all the roads are also called dreef of something (e.g. a tree Eikendreef), unless you have really memorised the name of the return trail well, you might have a doubt or two. 

Anyway, the forest is most special for its flowers. We already saw some daffondils (narciscus) and in a month or so, the blue wild hyacints should be up there. It's an amazing blue carpet that covers huge parts of the forest! 

Reading about the plants in the forest also explained something about a curious smell that we sometimes would smell. There were spots in the forest that, around late sping, smelled like garlic! It must be this one!

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