More wanderings in the World War One and Two battlefields of France and Belgium

For the last week we have been touring the world war one (and two) battlefields in northern France (Somme) and Belgium (Ypres). Due to the small provincial camping sites in France being quite pleasant but not having WIFI and the only one in Belgium having WIFI that did not work, the blog has not been updated for a while.

Here is the photo of the soviet war cemetery mentioned in the last blog

The area of northern France in the province of the Somme is beautiful country today but would have been a horror to fight in WWI. We have been staying in a lovely little hamlet called Cappy, on the side of the Somme river. This area has lots of WWI cemeteries, just in driving to the next minor town you pass a couple of beautifully kept British and Australian war cemeteries.

On Saturday night we went to the Menin Gate last post ceremony in Ypres (Ieper) in Belgium. That ceremony has been presented at 8pm each night since 1928 and is quite moving, in remembrance of the soldiers lost defending and re-capturing the town. Ieper was where the WIFI did not work and

the lady behind the desk was not interested in helping to sort out any problems, she definitely needed some customer service training!!!

Photo taken inside the Menin Gate during Last Post ceremony

On Monday, Anzac day we visited the Villers Bretonnaux Australian War memorial withjust  a few friends (about 4000 or so Australians and French). This was for the dawn service which was attended by the Australian ambassador and our foreign minister, Kevin Rudd. The service itself was quite moving, especially knowing that on the 24^th and 25th April 1918 Australian servicemen fought to liberate the town from the invader. This involved setting the alarm for 0330 (yes an unheard of time for Dorothy to get up but the alarm worked, thanks for the present Emma). The service started at 0530, by the time we got there at 0430 the line of vehicles parked alongside the road was over a kilometre long.

And many more people arrived after us! This photo is from our van looking towards the memorial, there was as much traffic further laong the road past where we parked!

After a late morning sleep to recover from the early rise, we visited the Pet’t train de haute Somme, the last of the WWI Narrow gauge trains that were used to support the front lines of both sides. This

was the first running for the season so was only diesel. Its been in preservation hands for 40 years now, the celebrations are later this year. The staff at the station also need some customer service training, the first train departs at 1430 but they only open the shop, museum and station at 1400. Thus we did not see enough of a very well laid out museum before we caught the train.

It has all the narrow gauge classics, roadside running, a tunnel, a zig zag and running alongside the Somme Canal to its depot.

And finally a scenery photo of the river/canal Mosel at Verdun