The first TankTasTocht of 2019 has the start and end points in Doetinchem at the McDonald's. Important? The Achterhoek is no longer important. That was in the time of the Eighty Years' War when the Spaniards were kept out here. What remains are a few beautiful fortified towns and a close-knit network of roads on which it is nice to tour. Until you feel dizzy!

No major highway is passing through. There is no big city. No major industries are established. So what do you have to look for? Well ... enough. First, in the river country, they might think they invented the bend. But after 140 kilometers in Achterhoek I could no longer see a bend, what a twist. But nice if you arrive in time for a cup. And secondly: it is beautiful, the landscape there is also varied, because towards Winterswijk it is mostly intimate, more to the west it breaks open and you feel more in the river area - spacious and light.

The party starts in Doetinchem where I first do a tour of the city - you can still feel the injuries that the Second World War left behind here. At the station, you end up in the Public Transport and Toy Museum, a world full of innocence, with men of a certain age who build a railway bridge on their knees and cannot keep their mouth shut for a moment. Amidst all that innocence, the poster of one Toon from Winterswijk, entitled 'Tintin and the Heerlijkheid Etten', stands out. Then we see our fast-paced reporter greedily looking at the bare tits of a half-undressed lady, with a passionate Bobby barking at his feet who apparently doesn't trust it. Hey, finally, Tintin has become human!

You immediately drive down deep down into the Achterhoek. The Ellegoorsestraat - delicious. The Varsseveldseweg - solid cracks. The surroundings of Slangenburg castle - beautiful, with those avenues. And what makes it especially pleasant: it is quiet on the road so that you can put your motorcycle undisturbed on the left and on the right. Also seen: T-houses, a sign that you are still in the grip of the river landscape in the neighborhood of Silvolde.

At Dinxperlo the landscape becomes more intimate and the curves more numerous, it gives me a wet back. Of course you drive in the border town just past the Rietstapkerkje and over the Heelweg, which has not yet turned into a bargain paradise, with on the one hand butcher Eric van Schie and on the other, the German side Metzgerei Baumann - that has been around for an eternity. For those who are interested: continue from Dinxperlo to Anholt because there is a moated castle, with a museum (Rembrandt!) And gardens in Baroque and English landscape style. Impressive!

In the direction of Aalten it goes up a bit and the landscape becomes even more idyllic, with a fine farm always as a target point between the trees and the farmlands. It is what you call a fine-grained road system that you drive on, with lanes that provide a lot of variety. The next stop will be the Markt in Aalten, to my surprise on top of a real bump - it must have been a great location, among the swamps that once lay here. And what do you learn in the National Hiding Museum? That Aalten was perhaps the champion of people in hiding in the Second World War - at the right time, no fewer than 2,500 fugitives were staying in the 13,000 inhabitants.

Whoever says Aalten, also says Bredevoort, a stone's throw to the northeast. And for Bredevoort you have to get off, gentlemen motorcyclists. Goodness, what a funny hamlet hides behind 't Zand and Prinsenstraat and Boterstraat and Officierstraat. It was once a fortress that played an important role in the Eighty Years' War, now it is a sweet reminder of the time that we were still driving by horse and carriage and all went to church well. Looking back nostalgically, that's what Bredevoort lends itself to.

In the direction of Winterswijk you enter the landscape of the farmers' farmers. It means more forest and long narrow lanes - a nice drive and I am thinking in particular of the Kroondijk and the Smeenkstegge and the Meenkmolenweg with its nice curves. A nice story, by the way, those farmers. They were once managers of estates who, on behalf of the owners (monasteries, nobility), had to supervise the tenant farmers and their obligations. In an attempt to keep the wealth in their own circle, the twenty families of scholar farmers mainly married in their own circle, resulting in all kinds of hereditary diseases. At the end of the nineteenth century, many mentally ill people were already walking through the forests around Winterswijk and of course there came a natural end to their spindly lifestyle. What remains is a monumental landscape that has missed the battle for modernity.

The next stop is at Wissink's, on the Markt in Groenlo - another funny fortified town in the east of the country. They also have a museum there, about the Eighty Years' War, which has kept a great home here and which, according to the comments of the men who welcome the visit, is still valid today. One says: "To spare the fortress of Holland, sacrifices have been made here. That is still the case today. We call that Hollanditis! " It does not stop the inhabitants from replacing the Siege of Groenlo from 1627 every two years, the battle in which Frederik Hendrik finally annexed the fortress to Holland! (Source: Promoter 02-2019).

Because I have driven large parts of this route myself, this route gets 4 stars.