Today was a tour day out of our Airbnb apartment in
Lille. The parking on the van ran out at
9:00 Am this morning so we were all out on the street and in the van by 9:00
Am. It was a 40 kms drive down to Arras
this morning. Ken had volunteered to
give Agnes a break from driving so he was the wheelman and I was the
navigator. I had selected a couple of
must see sites to visit and I entered them into the Garmin and we were off.
The first was the Albain St-Nazaire French Military
Cemetery. This is the largest cemetery
and the national French military cemetery.
It is situated on a very commanding hill just north of Arras. There are
40,000 French soldiers who were killed in the battle of Artois buried in this
cemetery. It consists of a huge Basilica,
which was unfortunately closed for restoration work and an obelisk. The stone work on the basilica and obelisk
are unbelievably detailed and beautiful.
Inside the obelisk are some coffins
which represent the Unknown Soldier and a museum which details the battles
surrounding Arras. There is also a huge
more modern structure which houses 580,000 names of those killed on both sides
during the four years of war in the Calais area. It was a very touching site.
The next stop was Vimy Ridge and the very famous Canadian
monument. I don’t think there is a more
famous monument which represents the entire war more than the Vimy Ridge
monument with its two spires. As it is
located on a high ridge it can be seen for a very long way off. The
group headed straight for the monument and we were awed by it. The figures on the monument are so
compelling. After touring the monument
we walked over to the visitor’s center and walked through the trench
recreation. There is a huge area
surrounding the monument and the visitor center which has been left as it was
in 1918. The craters and battle area are
now covered in grass and trees but leave no doubt in your mind as to how
terrible it must have been. There are
lots of signs warning of unexploded munitions.
Everyone agreed it was past lunch so off to find lunch. After a sandwich from the local boulangerie
we tried to find the Arras monument but were unable to locate it. So it was time to head back to Lille. Everyone wanted to have a little rest time on
the day off. I certainly wasn’t going to
argue.
Terry hot biker
2 comments:
Great monument tour. Sobering.
Capturing Vimy Ridge was a significant achievement for our Canadian forces. The French and English suffered about 200,000 casualties trying to retake this area between 1914 and 1916. Canada was given the task of regaining the Ridge in the spring of 1916 under the direction of General Currie. After a year of plannibg, the Canadians over ran the German defenses in four days, between April 9 -11, 1917, at a cost of about 10,000 casualties.
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