In Maastricht, I left the A2 highway in favor of the N287 towards Margraten and Vaals entering an scenery and landscape that is untypical for. This region is located in close proximity to the German Eiffel and the Belgian Ardennes and offers some nice driving-tours in a hilly-environment with mountains up to 360mtr’s in height. Just before entering the village of Slenaken, a Polaris-Grey E24 came from the left and I quickly recognized this as Rob’s car. Although we participated in Email discussions for quite some time, we never met in person. In Slenaken, we both turned right towards Teuven in Belgium were we arrived at tavern Moeder de Gans in Teuven (Belgium) only ten minutes after the scheduled time of arrival.
Robert, Martijn and Han represented the S38-popution with a 1992 E34 M5 3.6 respectively a 1995 E34 M5 Touring. They arrived at around 12:30PM.
After the initial greetings and chats, we walked towards tavern Moeder de Gans for Lunch. This is an old-and popular establishment where one can eat in casual environment without worrying about protocol or time.
At around 3:00PM we all finished our meals after which we started with the driving-tour. This driving tour is identical to the tour that we drove on the 7th of November 2010 with m5board’s E39 M5 community, albeit in a much warmer ambient; temperature rose to almost 22°C which is unique so late in the season in this part of the hemisphere. It felt as if it was spring, but the nature had progressed well into the autumn; one could describe this is a golden-autumn.
As there is only a very small area in Belgium south of the border with the Dutch-Limburg that has Dutch as native language, we also entered French-language Wallonia. This crossing is only noticed by the names of the villages. We $planned our first stop at the abbey of Val Dieux, but with such good weather, there was no opportunity to line-up the cars so we continued driving. We maintained a moderate pace on the small and poor condition Belgium country roads; Sometimes spirited, but generally relaxed to enjoy the lovely scenery as well.
After about an hour of driving on the Belgium roads that generally have a poor state of maintenance compared to the roads in the Netherlands and Germany, we crossed the border at Le-Planc towards Slenaken and Eperheide where we stopped for a brief moment to enjoy the scenic view. The Classic Bugatti was almost left unnoticed on the parking area.
This particular car certainly isn’t a Pebble beach or Villa-d’Este contest-winner, but does it have to be ? One can smell the cars history and lovely patina of decades of enthusiast-use. Actually, this is much better than those overtly restored cars that are stashed away inside museums and private collections ?
Note the eight sparkplugs; lovely.
Well, back to the topic and subject; #231 at Eperheide with a view onto the Vijlenerberg and Vaalserberg.
After about thirty minutes, we resumed our trip towards Epen and the Vijlener-forest and the small ascent to the Vijlenerberg where we ended the driving-tour on the terrace of café ‘t Hijgende Hert.
From a driving point of view the south of Limburg offers more than plenty routes; don’t expect challenging driving-roads such as the many passes in the Alps. For that, the hills are by far not high enough. Even for spoiled enthusiasts like me, the south of Limburg and the nearby Belgium country-side offers a unique friendly and open atmosphere that doesn’t really compare. And if that is not enough, a visit to this region can easily be combined with the Eiffel-region or the Ardennes, albeit the condition of the tarmac in Belgium is way below Dutch or German standards.
