Steenwerck, between the Flemish mountains and the French lily

Immediately after the start, you notice the white-red of the GR121B. It is the signpost for most of the morning trip. It sends you out of the village on a path towards the Chapel Notre Dame de Confiance. A little further you walk under the TGV bridge and with the Lothé Bridge over the river La Serpentine.

You continue walking along quiet paved roads. Hedgerows, willows and pollards offer the necessary variety and walk directly to Lys. Walking upstream through the meadows, it is a pure pleasure of the freshwater flora along the tranquil fish-rich river. At the bridge you cross the Lys, change department (Le Nord becomes Pas-de-Calais) and end up at Bac-Saint-Maur, hamlet of Sailly-sur-la-Lys.

You will look for the Country Way. This beautiful walking route takes you to the rue de la Gare and the old train station, now a restaurant. The old manoeuvring tracks have disappeared and have been transformed into a valuable breeding area for green birds. You cross the sports field. Past the gym, housed in an old stone oven where many Flemish seasonal arbieder earned the money they so badly needed, you reach the Chapel of Our Lady of Consolation and a hundred meters further the right bank of the Leie.

The following is undeniably the most beautiful course of the day. Sometimes through a green tunnel of overhanging (shaded) trees, sometimes open and exposed, you walk, first on a concrete path but extended by a gravel path, between the Leie and the Leiebroeken. Near the Pont de la Lys in Sailly-sur-la-Lys, the path ends with a pleasant (covered) picnic area overlooking the river and its jetty for pleasure boats.

After the lunch break, you cross the bridge of the Lys, leave Sailly-sur-la-Lys and return to Steenwerck territory (Nord department). What follows is another acquaintance of the flat valley of the Leie with its immense views of a seemingly infinite horizon. You walk on narrow and quiet asphalt roads through the fields. Hoeven, each with its own name, and the chapels give an accent to this region here and there.