Monschau: Squeal Piggy
Monschau. Flowers. Water. No Banjos
It Rains in Monschau!
Bumped into Kenneth and Miriam by the car park just outside Monschau’s historic centre. They were from Aachen on a day trip. We were sheltering away from the torrential rain. “Why did you come to Monschau?” asked Kenneth. Indeed, why? “Found it on a map,” I replied and he found this funny. I went back to the car, got an umbrella and said my goodbyes. Nice people.
No, I’m not going soft on you but, niceness deserves niceness. I’m a fucking buddha these days. A real karma chameleon. All about that. Still a bitch though, don’t worry.
The Franco’s Fiesta tour moves on. The drive down from Breda was two and half hours as I sweated out last night’s excesses. Was I really a rockstar last night? Nobody who was there remembers, except, mein herren, there’s a video. Watch it. Bask in my short lived glory. Notice the applause died before I left the stage.
Why am I here, in Monschau?
Good question, ladies (and Kenneth). Something about me looking for good continental Christmas markets last year. And ending up going to Dordrecht (on the wrong day FFS, that was a dreary experience) and Bruges instead. You can read about my escapades last Christmas on this website. I called it The Darkness of Bruges. Very mysterious. These depths have hidden shadows (shallows, Tim? What? Just askin’).
Deliverance - German Style
“You got a real prutty mouth there, Typ.”
There are no banjos playing but I think I’ve stumbled into Monschau’s version of a hillybilly shack. Lots of locals crowd the bar looking at me like I’m a Ned Beatty. And they don’t even know me! My lack of German is not charming nor interesting here. Nor is my flowery shirt and jacket. I’m sure I heard one of them say, in German of course, ‘squeal piggy!’.
My attempts at German are met with, knowing smiles between the checked shirt clientele. Of course, my understanding of the local dialect is a little rusty but I’m sure the barman added, ‘for you mate, here’s that flat half pint I’ve been saving since 1990 for the exact moment you, with your fucking flowery shirt and laptop walked in. Let me, clears throat, add to that?’. Again, I may just be culturally unaware… No! They’re a bunch of inbred wankers. Let’s get out of here! (The name of the bar will appear below with the others, you’ll know which.)
Redemption
How different… Marco at Zum Haller. Shit! This guy is good - how hosting should be done. Just across the road from the Deliverance Motel. I can’t praise Zum Haller enough. Tourist… Go there! Run! This bar. This host (and wife, didn’t get her name but equally)… The contrast is ridiculous. One (unnamed bar, below you can guess) all about laughing at the tourist and this one, was night and day. Basically - first bar was - hello, here’s your new cell mate Bubba - and the second a romantic date with a beautiful woman where everything clicks. Do I overstate? No. With a tourist you get one chance. Yeah, hill billy boys, enjoy the bar closing cos it’s tourists who keep you going. See Marco. See Fabian. Hospitality done right.
Marco. Fuck this guy is a star. He makes everyone feel welcome. Invites them to sit at the bar and talk with his other customers. A community feel, everyone welcome. A Germanic Cheers. I was all about - I’m a writer and I want my own table so I can be magestisterial and judge you bitches. He didn’t let me. He pointed to a stool at the end of bar and made me sit there and chat to his patrons.
There were some English. Some Belgians. Some Germans. We chatted. We felt part of a temporary community. All engineered by Marco. This doesn’t happen naturally. It takes skill and a love of humanity. Across the road it was all, “you got a real prutty month on you boy” over at Zum Haller it was all friendship vibes and customer focused.
The ladies…
Erm, more mature here?
I need to add Kiki. She sussed me writing on my table, in my flowery shirt and jacket screaming ‘look at me, don’t look at me! Kept staring at me from across the bar. I know I’m handsome but she was more interested in the writing, it seemed. However, I miss cues like a drunken has been actor during a provincial pantomime run. She paused and turned back as her husband was leaving. Quizzed me about my writing. We played with metaphors and abstractions. Which is a pretentious way of saying, things were left unsaid that er, should remain unsaid. It’s better that way.
The mother and daughter combo sat next to me in Zum Haller. If it were one, or the other, then the night could have been different (Really Tim? Getting up your own arse here). We chatted superficially but the elder wasn’t going to let the younger and the younger would be disgusted with the elder. Which is a lot of words to say, the preselection fairies dropped me from their team sheet.
Frankly, if you’re after action Monschau is all about couples. Couples who are using the setting to ‘reset’ their relationship. Okay, yeah, I failed. Move on.
And Monschau Tim?
It’s pretty. Like the pictures you’ve seen. So, if you like taking pictures of people taking pictures then it’s perfect… It is chocolate boxy and it is full of tourists but there has to be something there in the first place to sketch out the corners of that chocolate box. Personally, I’d like to see it in the snow. It will add a little wintery magic to an already beautiful place. The walk up to the castle is only slightly strenuous - well if you’re a toned athlete like myself of course. Nice views when you get there and worth the trek.
The area in a way reminds me strangely of both Normandy and the Lake District. The slate stone buildings, the rain; very Windermere. The rolling and verdant landscape however is very Côte Fleurie. There’s even a belle époque thing going on here with the very grand houses that populate this valley.
Honest review? It’s probably best seen from within a couple. If you want to show off to your partner and hope for that ‘thing’ you only get twice yearly when you’re a good boy, it’s probably the right place.
Bars In Monschau
I’ll start in reverse order:
MON-Bistro. (Does not deserve a link). Shall we say, a locals bar? Let’s leave it that. Zero stars.
Lütticher Hof - (doesn’t deserve a link) great location with terrace overlooking the river. My advice? Avoid. the service is, how to say this? “Swift and efficient”, and, being politically correct, not effused with ‘German’ hospitality. If you just order a drink then the, er, madam, is very much obliged - to mention to you - several times - that you have to pay cash. Very insistent on that. “Only cash. Only cash!” she says pointing at the plastic covered menu. As I mentioned, great location. But it’s a production line tourists-are-cattle type service. I left after being ordered around too much. Not a great example of Monschau. Avoid - do not go there. Luckily, there are much better examples of German hospitality in the town.
Hotel Horchem- Braukeller - underneath Hotel Hochem. I’ll start by saying whatever Fabian is paid, double it! What a great guy. Exactly the sort of person you want serving you in a German bierkeller. No plastic menus thrust under your nose, no angry intro greetings ‘cash only under €20’. I’d come back here again and again and happily. A basement bar, it's hidden in plain sight - you have to descend into a basement right in the centre of Monschau. Although Germans aren’t quite as good at English as the Dutch (they’re still bloody good it has to be said), what strikes me is how very friendly they are - outside Deliverance Bar of course. Rando observation: When it comes down to it, there’s really no difference between the people that invaded England a millennium (or so) ago and gave us the name Anglo-Saxons! We both like beer. We like to laugh. We’re proud of our countries. I salute that. Shout out to Pascal and his cycling team and sorry I couldn’t help drain your beer fountain.
Zum Haller- top bar, by far. Marco is the Prince, the Kaiser of Monschau. Here I was, recommended by AI that this was my ideal bar, dark, good wifi, able to sit in a corner and write. Wow! No. Marco wasn’t taking any of that shit and directed me to a vacant bar stool and commanded me to sit there saying ‘we’re all friends here’. We were a multi language / country crew but, to Marco, we’re a community in his bar. And - boy! - he works it. Unlike Deliverance Bar above, he makes everyone part of his community. What a skill. The guy - and his wife - deserve their top rating. Go there. He’s the real deal. Interestingly enough, the people I struggled with most were the bikers from Lancashire. They - perhaps rightly perhaps - distrusted my ‘hail fellow, well met’ personality (flowery shirt / jacket blah blah). When I let slip that I’m also from Lancashire, and, with a flourish and a deeper voice, resurrected my Rochdale accent, they looked at me like I just told them I see their wives when they’re out on their biking tours. Oh well, the Belgium couple were nice.
And Monschau? Worth it?
Yes. Bit of tourist trap though undeniably pretty (not prutty). I saw it in the rain and I saw it during the all too brief bouts of sunshine. As mentioned above, probably come here if a) you’re with your other half and want to impress b) Christmas market hunting. Great setting.
Where did I stay?
Haus Stehling. Amazing views overlooking the babbling river. If you can, book this, you’ll not be disappointed. A mini apartment. Very good spot just thirty seconds from the main square. River sounds included so if you don’t like water or are a light sleeper, not the one for you.
Beers etc
Mainly Bitburger. Got ripped off in Deliverance bar with some 0.2cl shit when I asked for a grosse beer. Taking the piss, literally. Food, I had a veal cutlet in mushroom sauce. Or something. I was ‘peaking’ by that point. Standard. Hit the spot though. Need to search for a sausage.
And that my friends, is the ideal mic drop moment.
Read the rest of the Tour
So I toured Breda, Monschau and Mons. Collectively, we call this the Franco’s Fiesta Tour. Why? Because I’m shamelessly - some would say needlessly - plugging a book. One sale. Two sales. It’s all fucking free on Amazon anyway. No one’s getting rich here but I’m an artist. Piss artist maybe but ears remain intact so don’t worry my literary children. Mons next.
Breda: The Franco’s Fiesta Tour
Street Scene: Breda June 2026
Flip over. Play the B Side
I was gonna one way about Breda. And then, I flipped it and went hard the other way. Wow! What a night. Didn’t expect that. See the video below. But back to ‘the story’.
“Wise words, Sir, stand the test of time, and I am very glad the House has allowed me, after an interval of fifteen years, to raise the tattered flag I found lying on a stricken field.” Churchill House of Commons 1901
Churchill and Breda?
Winston Churchill, in one of first speeches as a newly elected MP, vainly defended his mad, bad and syphilitic father Randolph. The words echo to me now, sat in Café Bruxelles in Breda, as I also try to raise a different tattered flag from a stricken field.
(Editor note, raising flags from where they lie fallen… Mmm. What could that be a metaphor for? Yeah, doing poor sex gags again. Sorry. Not sorry.)
But my cause is different, though perhaps equally as hopeless. I’m in Breda, in June, surrounded by Belgian beers (yes, I know they should be Dutch, but Heineken tastes like piss) and an empty bowl of bitterballen. I start with a purpose that is clear as I reach down upon ancient literary battlefields, stooping for the pride lost so very long ago.
My novel Franco’s Fiesta.
FF - as it was never known - is not about Breda (though I will get to that, video evidence below, don’t worry would-be tourist doing a quick Google search). As a novel, Franco’s Fiesta was ahead of its time. A prophet without honour in its own chosen field. A dark star obscured on a stormy night. It was the unattributed fart in the lift of literary taste.
Yeah, I think I bought all the copies. And yet, and yet. The ghost of it lingers on, on Amazon. The paperback version - those few copies I didn’t buy - are being resold for high prices. No residuals for me I hasten to add (and at higher prices, goddamn it!).
I read one of my copies every now and again. I like a good page turner. Being honest, there are many things I like about it and several that I don’t. I know what I was trying to achieve, what I was trying to say - who and what I was appealing to. In this, I nearly succeeded. Writers are solitary creatures and I, at that point in my life, needed to turn inwards. So, I wrote a novel in a way I never had before or have since.
Breda, Anyone?
But enough of my yakking. This bar in Breda plays a real eclectic mix of English music. We’re in Smokie territory now ‘Next Door to Alice” for example. No, not the shit one that added “Alice, Alice, who the fuck is Alice’. Love the music selection. Some Beatles now. Music: Our greatest export. The UK is revered the world over for our pop and rock. Next one? ‘Winner Takes it All’ - dammit - the best song ever! From Sweden.
Breda: Things I won’t be talking about for those tourists that have strayed here.
The church (st. fuck knows, highest bellend tower blah blah)
The museums (lace or something)
All the other stuff
Things I will be talking about
Me
Franco’s Fiesta
Bars and Food in Breda. Getting slowly dazed and confused (step away from that laptop, Tim).
Why the fuck it is pissing down in June like Noah needs to build a bloody ark (if they had hills around here)?
Random interactions that a handsome, brown eyed man gets into. For example:
The Two Girls In the Bar
They will - forever - remain the two girls in the bar. It’s too early in the day for quotidian flirting. I’ve not even checked into my posh hotel yet but I’m three beers and seven bitterballen down. Still; there are two attractive ladies in Bar Bruxelles… We sat near each other; they, chatting knocking back wine, laughing, brushing back their hair, me, tapping on my laptop, pretending not to notice. I went outside, they went outside. Tick. They went inside and, er, I followed. So cool, so Alpha unchained. I left the bar unobserved. They’ll think about me tonight.
Back to the plot
The plot? I lost that some beers ago. They’ll be more about Breda but first, let’s talk about me, the misunderstood artist.
This literary device, the awkward pivot, is something I mastered despite not going having a degree in modern dance. A shimmy here, a shake there, a graceful pirouette , this muscle memory allows me to pivot shamelessly from one thing to another with grace and years of practice.
Franco’s Fiesta (for we are talking about this, in Breda) was a unique experience in my literary career as I wasn’t in the novel. Well; a bit, of course, but not much. I deliberately wrote it to get away from my usual ‘short guy whines about not getting the girl’ plot my previous novels explored ad nauseam. (See Two Girls In the Bar Above for a new episode of this old drama).
Interestingly enough, the first 50 or so pages of Franco’s Fiesta were written abroad, in a village outside Valencia. Hence, I had real insight into the local colour, sights, flavours, rhythms and signs. The plot is a rather obvious take on Richard Burton making a movie with a hot, and younger, co-star whilst the Elizabeth Taylor character watches on, observing from one bourbon to another. Add the Falangist regime, a strung out Eric Clapton cameo plus a Marxist director and you have a great story. At least, that’s what I thought.
Although I’m old, so very old, I don’t actually remember 1970 when the novel was set. Consequently I spent ages researching the feel of Spain, of Valencia in 1970. I’d write down descriptions of market squares, of shops, of shop signs, of children playing in the street late on hot summer evenings. The layout of the brickwork in the market square. The smell and look of the vegetation as the seasons changed.
Here’s how the marketing plan went.
A runaway successful novel. Bought by millions. Of course.
Calls, so many calls!, from top drawer agents wanted to represent me to sell the movie rights. I know the difference between net and gross, don’t take the piss, mate!
A bidding war between various studios. “Not less than 7 digits or I walk".”
A multi million advance. Spent well, no revenge spend there. Hi - ex colleagues! Look at me now, bitches.
Chat shows. Think pieces in the broadsheets. Is he the new Amis?
A large salary paid as an advisor on the movie version of the picture. Casting rights? “Just tell again, how much do you want this part?”
Several gossipy articles about how Tim Robson has been seen partying in Hollywood linked to several famous actresses. (Passed on by Tim to every girl in his life, ever.)
Critically acclaimed release supported by stellar box office returns. “Is that Armani, Tim? Who’s that on your arm?”
Rinse. Repeat. Arise Sir Tim
However, my GTM missed the mark on one or two of the above. So let me list those misses:.
All of them.
Bars In Breda
De Heeren van Breda - just off the main square. It rained. And it rained. Friendly staff. WIfi works outside (under an awning). Edited most of this masterpiece in ‘observational tourism’. The main customers seemed to be the bar staff and their friends. Loved how the bar man, knowing I was English, called me ‘mate’.
Café Bruxelles - Large, wooden, central bar, interested barmaid who I gave carte blanche to recommend beers. My type of place. Again; friendly staff. Slightly wonky table as I wrote some of this masterpiece. See two girls interaction. It’s why I do this for you.
The other one - Jaap? Sat next to two alcoholic women balanced by two alcoholic men on the other side. A Dutch sandwich, lightly toasted. I went deeply fried with a plate of Dutch bar snacks. They hold me still in their breadcrumby embrace. Lovely owners. You should go there.
The Next One - Probably won’t write about this. Through discretion or, more probably, embarrassment. Nah, fuck it:
Ended up on stage with a live band at Cafe Lievense. It’s like the 90’s never stopped. See video below. I give this place my whole hearted support. Chatted with owner. Nice guy. Good concept. Fun crowd. I rocked. As you can see yourself!
Flagpole. Breda. Hints.
I was going to write that I hoped I’d find those two girls from earlier on and tell them all about Winston’s flagpole quote. But, no one wins from that Tim, so I decided to go with a few 8% Delirium Reds instead. I know where my pleasures ultimately lie. No one’s going to be talking about flagpoles tonight so, here’s some touristy things:
Interesting that when listening to Dutch conversations between natives they often slip into English to make a point. Also, the rhythm of Dutch and English is very similar. Just got dragged into a football conversation about the Premier League. Had to admit, I know fuck all. The Crises of the 3rd Century? Mick Taylor guitar solos? They invited me over anyway. But… Laptop, yeah? I watch. You talk.
Those tinkly bells on the hour. Every hour. In every Dutch city I’ve been to. You know you’re not in England.
Are there any nicer people than the Dutch? They’re fluent in other languages but also friendly and cool. Always love coming back here. They love me too. And big here. See video below.
Did I mention the rain? Seriously! Every bloody time. Well, not exactly true. I went to Maastricht a few years back, my hotel had a pool next to which I posed in my long shorts (calm down ladies - it’s before I lost the weight!). It was only a few years ago and it seemed cash was king. Now? All about those Apple Wallets. Progress?
Canals. Tick. Bikes. Tick.
Come? Don’t come? Do you think I care? Buy the book.
Getting Down to Neil in Breda
Read On
It’s not my first time in the Low Countries. You should check out Me and F Scott Fitzgerald in Delft or Rainy Antwerp or the Darkness of Bruges. Or just the whole lot - Scabrous City Tours.