This is it, the final chapter in mine and Flub's epic Belgium roadtrip. As soon as I mentioned to him there was an entire abandoned village up near Antwerp he was like 'WE'RE GOING'. And lo, we did.
It's a weird feeling, you drive up north past Antwerp and suddenly the motorway empties and the land becomes wide and barren, we were the only car on the road for a good 10 miles until we were joined by a coach. Paying 6 Euros at the toll booth to get access to the industrial docklands and we were 'in', the land full of container storage plants, enormous dock cranes, fuel storage depots and no sign of this little village anywhere. Until the roads became twistier, we saw a patch of green and a turn-off with an electrical building on the corner, and a sign 'Doel'. With a Nuclear power station built not much more than a mile from little village the plant's owners wanted the resident out - now only a couple of houses are lived in and the only amenities open are the bar and church. We parked the car in the village and it turned out as it was such a nice day a fair few others had had the same idea, and there was also a coach party of old people going to a service in the church. We both loved it here, it's such an odd place and a great chilled way to end the trip.
Securities obviously go round and board stuff up pretty regularly however we still found a few things open including the community hall/theatre.
It was so hard to cut down 130 photos into a report, there is so much amazing graffiti there I couldn't fit in so they're all viewable here
Doel Abandoned Village
Thanks for bearing with me through all my Belgium posts, normal service is resumed now.
It's a weird feeling, you drive up north past Antwerp and suddenly the motorway empties and the land becomes wide and barren, we were the only car on the road for a good 10 miles until we were joined by a coach. Paying 6 Euros at the toll booth to get access to the industrial docklands and we were 'in', the land full of container storage plants, enormous dock cranes, fuel storage depots and no sign of this little village anywhere. Until the roads became twistier, we saw a patch of green and a turn-off with an electrical building on the corner, and a sign 'Doel'. With a Nuclear power station built not much more than a mile from little village the plant's owners wanted the resident out - now only a couple of houses are lived in and the only amenities open are the bar and church. We parked the car in the village and it turned out as it was such a nice day a fair few others had had the same idea, and there was also a coach party of old people going to a service in the church. We both loved it here, it's such an odd place and a great chilled way to end the trip.
Securities obviously go round and board stuff up pretty regularly however we still found a few things open including the community hall/theatre.
It was so hard to cut down 130 photos into a report, there is so much amazing graffiti there I couldn't fit in so they're all viewable here
Doel Abandoned Village
Thanks for bearing with me through all my Belgium posts, normal service is resumed now.
