Over the last few days we’ve been walking through the Scarpe-Escaut national park.

Poppies in a hayfield in scarpe escaut

We’ve seen forests, farmland and surprisingly pleasing mining slag heaps that dot the landscape. It’s amazing to see all the plants and trees growing out of these massive piles of rock.

Trail, half way up a slag heap left over from mining

And you get an excellent view from the top.

View of scarpe escaut from the top of one of the slag heaps

Along the way we also saw:

A mine-shaft winding tower.

The winding tower that would have sat at the top of a mine shaft

An old tower which used to pump water out of the mines.

The pumping tower

Loads of logs, piled to the side of the paths, some with their own QR codes.

A log with a QR code

A lovely man who ran a sandwich shop in the town of Beuvrages.

The sandwich shop run by the nice man

When we told him about our trip, he gave us water and snacks for free. What a gent.

We reckon we’ve walked about 40 miles so far - 10 by mistake. Oops.

Tom