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Zonnebeke

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  • TravelerEUROPE
    11
    Day 46

    Days 44 and 45

    October 3, 2023 in Belgium ⋅ 🌙 15 °C

    Day 44
    Day 2 of Battlefields tour.

    Photos - 1 and 2- after attending a short rememberance ceremony at the Menin Gates we had dinner with our guide at a really nice hotel in Ypres, Belgium called the Depot. Volunteers conduct this service which includes playing the last post at 8pm 365 nights a year in appreciation of all those who served - an incredible comittment
    Photo 3 - Tyne Cot - largest Commonwealth war cemetery in the world
    Photo 4 - letter advising parents their son is deceased
    Photo 5 - remains of caterpillar mine crater - one of a series of mines that were placed along the German front line by tunnelling

    Day 45
    The tour of The Catacombs in Paris is approximately 2 km long and deep underground. It contains the bones of over 6 million people. There's 140 steps to go down and 112 to get out. The height dips to 5' 11" in some places. It's a bit freaky down there quite macabre and a bit eerie. Thankfully reasonably well lit !!

    Photos 6 and 7- Catacomb's tunnels
    Photos 8 - 10 - bones

    Last night in Paris heading for Singapore via Dubai tomorrow night.    Read more

  • TravelerEUROPE
    111
    Day 45–46

    Days 42 and 43

    October 2, 2023 in Belgium ⋅ ☁️ 21 °C

    Day 42 was meant to be utopia for John who found a sports bar to watch the rugby league grand final live. He then went to the Prix de l'arc de Triomphe (Melbourne Cup of Europe). At least the races part was good !!
    Photos 1 - 3- sports bar and races
    Video 1 - race crowd do the Viking clap like the Canberra raiders

    Day 43
    Photo 4 - Adelaide Cemetary outside Villers Bretonneux. An unknown soldier has been removed from this cemetary and placed in Canberra

    Photos 5, - 7with our guide at the John Monash Centre - a museum and interpretative centre that commemorates Australian servicemen and women who served on the Western Front during the first world war
    Photo 8 - battlefields and war cemetaries visited today
    Photo 9 - Memorial to women at the Lochnagar Crater
    Video 2 - Lochnagar Crater (tunnel dug under major German command centre in order to blow it up)
    Photo 10 - memorial to all animals used in the war effort - horses, mules, dogs and pigeons
    Photo 11 - Pheasant Wood cemetary at Fromelles - newest war
    cemetary created following the discovery of 6 mass graves in 2008
    Photo 12 - VC Corner Australian Cemetary - the only cemetary that has just Australian soldiers (known and unknown)    Read more

  • Europe Xmas River Cruise ++
    2
    Day 20

    Rifleman Frederick Alley

    January 2 in Belgium ⋅ ⛅ 6 °C

    Rifleman Frederick Alley DOD 13Dec17 Age unknown

    Killed in Action

    3 NZ Rifle Brigade, 3 Battalion

    Grave Plot II, C.22

    The site of the current cemetery was until the Third Battle of Ypres in no man’s land. On July 31, 1917, the 15th (Scottish) Division captured the Lost Corner and Freiberg with the 55th (West Lancashire) Division on their left flank. The cemetery was started the next month by the 15th and 16th (Irish) Division, under the name ‘New Cemetery, Frezenberg’. A few weeks later, however, a British plane crashed near the current ‘Cross of Sacrifice’, which earned the cemetery its current name, Aeroplane Cemetery. The cemetery was used by combat units until March 1918.

    The cemetery includes the graves of 15 men who served with the New Zealand Expeditionary Force.

    Plots II to VIII, and part of Plot I, were formed after the Armistice when graves were brought in from small burial grounds and the surrounding battlefields. There are now 1,105 Commonwealth servicemen of the First World War buried or commemorated in this cemetery. 636 of the burials are unidentified but special memorials commemorate eight casualties known or believed to be buried among them.    Read more

  • Europe Xmas River Cruise ++
    21
    Day 20

    Tracing Alfred William Alley’s movements

    January 2 in Belgium ⋅ ☁️ 4 °C

    Through finding Alfred’s battalion diaries written by the commanding officer we were able to trace where he was in the few days before he died.

    Their camp was moved from one location to a few kilometres away & Alfred and some others were sent to a supply dump site called Hornby where they were tasked with making g some accommodations. It was when they were returning from Hornby dump to the new camp site that they came under artillery fire and he and another man were killed and some wounded, all from his brigade.Read more

  • TravelerEUROPE & UK 2024
    Day 12

    Day 12: Ypres to Hamme

    April 25, 2024 in Belgium ⋅ 🌬 11 °C

    Celebrated an emotional ANZAC day at the Menin Gates. Visited war memorial sites. Met Ed the old Aussie whose son owns Goodiesons brewery in McLaren vale. Gonna meet us there sometime! Graham has a knack for finding the best country pubs.Read more

  • TravelerGrand Tour of Europe - 2023
    Day 63

    Tyne Cot Cemetery

    July 4, 2023 in Belgium ⋅ ☁️ 15 °C

    Tyne Cot is the largest Commonweath war grave cemetery in the world. There are 950 in France and Belgium. It is on the site of the Battle of Broodseinde, which involved Australian and allied troops in 1917.

    The heavy battles took place in this area as the Allies attempted to take control of the ridges and high ground from the Germans.

    Tyne Cot contains 12000 graves, 9000 of whom are unknown. The walls list the names of 34000 British soldiers with no known grave.    Read more

  • TravelerGrand Tour of Europe - 2023
    Day 62

    Hill 60

    July 3, 2023 in Belgium ⋅ ☁️ 17 °C

    Hill 60 was a strategic high point in the German lines. In June 1917, Australian and British tunnelers and miners exploded 19 mines beneath it and other hills along the Messines Ridge with devastating effect. It was an impact that, some said, was felt in London. This was a turning point in the Battle of Messines.

    The site has been preserved as it was at the end of the war, except for regrowth, so the craters can still be seen.    Read more

  • TravelerGrand Tour of Europe - 2023
    1
    Day 61

    Ypres

    July 2, 2023 in Belgium ⋅ ☀️ 17 °C

    We crossed into Belgium and the town of Ypres. It was completely flattened in the war and rebuilt by the end of the 1920's. Its destruction was used as a symbol of the devastation of war. It was described as a red stain on the ground, not from blood, but from pulverised red brick dust caused by bombing.

    It is well known as the home of the Menin Gate Memorial. Soldiers would pass through the gate in the towns ramparts on their way to the battlefields.

    You can't really see it at the moment as it is six weeks into a two year renovation. We will go to the nightly memorial service there tomorrow night.    Read more

  • Europe Xmas River Cruise ++
    Day 20

    Esssex Farm Cemetery

    January 2 in Belgium ⋅ ⛅ 5 °C

    This cemetery is in the site where Canadian doctor John McRae wrote the poem “InFlanders Fields”.

    He was inspired to write it on May 3, 1915, after presiding over the funeral of friend and fellow soldier Lieutenant Alexis Helmer, who died in the Second Battle of Ypres. According to legend, fellow soldiers retrieved the poem after McCrae, initially dissatisfied with his work, discarded it.

    The location also still has the remains of a field aid station he had built.    Read more

  • Europe Xmas River Cruise ++
    1
    Day 20

    Brothers in Arms Memorial

    January 2 in Belgium ⋅ ⛅ 6 °C

    We stumbled across this amazing memorial to all the groups of brothers who died in WWI, located in Zonnebeke just outside of Ypres. It was near the site of the Polygon Woods battle in which NZ & Australians took part.Read more

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