No Man's Land

We had decided to go on a trip to Baarle-Hertog, a very peculiar Belgian village in the Netherlands… We were going there because we had planned to go to an American cars gathering in Antwerp.



Here, my parents are one foot on the Belgian ground, and the other on the Dutch territory. If you wonder why they're laughing, that's because my brother — who was also on both lands simultaneously but behind me — just said: "J'ai une couille aux Pays-Bas et une en Belgique". What a silly ass!

We walked in the village, crossing the borderline several times. We even didn't know in which land we were walking… We could only guess by keeping an eye on road signs: Belgian ones are quite different from Dutch ones. After this relatively short walk in this peculiar village, we headed for the car, and drove to Antwerp.

Half an hour later, we arrived in the east suburds of the city. We wanted to go to the Cokerillkaai (Cockerill Quay), more to the west. We had to drive through the city. What a bad idea: today is Saturday, the day Flemish people go shopping around. There was a long traffic jam, mostly due to overnumerous traffic lights. But in the end, we arrived in the neighbourhood of our destination: a gathering of American cars.

Only my brother and I bought a ticket: it cost 16 € for both of us; my parents didn't feel like going there, they'd better walk instead. We walked on the quays where 300 to 400 American cars were parked, mostly coming from Belgium and the Netherlands, but also from Germany, France and Luxemburg.

The most popular car among owners seemed to be the Chevrolet Corvette, from the first model from the 1950s (the "Sting Ray") to the most recent one. There were cabrios, vans, coupés, trucks, ambulances, police cars, taxis, limos and other American stuff you coudn't even imagine (even a couple of funeral cars with a coffin inside them…). Everything. Everything but what we were coming for: not a single DeLorean!! Oh no! Last year, ten DeLoreans had gathered on the occasion of this American cars festival. But after all, maybe they'd come tomorrow… Oh no!

We were a bit disappointed, but it let us more time to look at vehicules that we don't usually see on the roads. We took a look on various cars, among which a brand-new Ford GT, attracting lots of people, but also that car which looked so amazingly like that of the character of Roy Neary (played by Richard Dreyfuss) in Close Encounters of the Third Kind by Spielberg. It even had a licence plate from Wyoming on the front bumper, even though it had a Belgian oldtimer plate at the back.

To conclude, I won't say much about the public: people trying to live in the American way. I mean the redneck way of life…