The castle I never got to see was one of the most magical ones I visited. Yup – still posting photos from my trip from last month. This time, my mystical, solitary invasion of the ruins of Kasteel #Pietersheim in the #Lanakan of #Belgium. As a castle-lover, this might have seems an anticlimax if it were not for the strange and palpable air of lore clinging to the air. Like a fragrance you can only barely whiff, the stories are lost and eroded, and the imagination begins to grow as wild was the remarkable National Parc Huge Kempen that luxuriates on all sides fo these ruins. While anticlimactic in some ways, these stubborn, ugly ruins were an unexpected highlight for me. Omg this trip I had wandered into the Lanakan a couple times by bicycle, and Pietershiem became an ideal and mellow half-day adventure for an American who loves to get curious. Very suddenly, a cavalry of angry clouds rolled forth to demand my surrender of the tower. I obliged, and as I huddled and waited among the roots of medieval row trees, sheltered quite remarkably by the hundreds of years of foliage which created a near perfect canopy above, I was joined by a curious and frustrated herd of local sheep. Annoyed by the smell of wet wool, they parked nearby, and the lot of us huddled and waited out the torrents, just as the serfs must have done millennia ago, excluded from the power of the Pietersheim. It was pretty much perfect. If you're going to get lost in #Limburg, make sure you wander here. Come alone. Bring your thoughts. Something of you will be left behind. But you will be glad it is. It's gone, but there's something about it all that persists. #hogekempen #kasteel #castle #flemish #flanders #kasteelpietersheim #moat #drawbridge #arch #medieval #dslr #fairytale #akaXN #TheRealXN (at Kasteel Pietersheim) https://www.instagram.com/p/B17m-r1n4uc/?igshid=rom4oiorjsxt