Here is a write up a a trip 3 of us took back in 2009, I though I would share it here, I hope this is the right place... A write up of the recently completed trip around some of the WW1 & WW2 battlefields of Europe, ie Belgium and France. This trip could never be described as Great fun, it was never intended to be, it can however, be described as very enjoyable, moving, somber and above all emotional. So, we began on Saturday morning, into the car down to Prestwick airport, dropped Anne and her clan off, they were off to sunny Espania - OLE! Back to mine and got changed then jumped astride the bike then off to Jeff's house. (The reason I mentioned the airport was because that was a 110 mile round trip before I even looked at the bike!) Huckled Jeff out of his wife's arms and the pair of us set of to Edinburgh, 85 miles later we were at Pauls house. Coerced some bacon and eggs out of Paul, then 20 mins later back on the road.. next stop Newcastle another 120 mile trip - God Bless Saddlemen and thier lovely after market seats! So at Newcastle jumped aboard the ferry for an all u can eat dinner and a few beers, next stop Ijmuiden (Amsterdam, Holland). Paul checking out the lifeboats ..... you never know.... Then about 30 miles out from Ijmuiden, a most amazing sight a seaborne windfarm, really don't know why people complain about these things, i think they are full of grace and beauty. Next morning we docked in Ijmuiden then jumped back on the bikes for a 200 mile hop to Lille for the first night's stopover. Jeff's Tomtom got us to "somewhere near to the hotel" and then when we stopped to ask for directions Paul's Hayabusa started playing silly games and he couldn't disable the alarm or get it started... Bugger! We were stuck there for a couple of hours trying different things.... Stranded... We decided to leave the bike for an hour or so, to give the fob battery some rest (we couldn't get a new battery as it was Sunday and everywhere was shut and at this point we deduced it could only be the fob battery). So we went back to the bike and the restaurantuer asked us to move it as he was opening up. We did, and hey presto the bike started playing again and has done ever since, we think that perhaps it was subject to some form of radio interference. Happy days. Next morning we set off for the war grave in St Omer, (one of Jeff's relatives lies there), hmm, I said "the war grave" I meant "a war grave" as the entire contryside is peppered with gravesites - hundreds of thousands of poor souls.. Anyway St Omer.. You may have noticed that the British military grave at St. Omer is joined on to the community graveyard, not that uncommon, apparently. It also contained a few souls from WW2... Jeff's relative. Well after that somber moment, it was back onto the bikes and off to Caen in Normandy for the next leg of the trip, another 200 mile hop. Tuesday morning Jeff and I went to the first of our normandy beaches via the beatiful wee town of Bayeux - where we went to visit the tapestry. and this is a replica of one of the boats William and his men used to cross the channel (to complete the one and only battle France has won against us! bastards!) Anyway they deserved to win if they were using boats like that, they even carried horses in them - mad bastards! [Anyway this is the end of part 1]
Okay I have a wee half hour, allow me to show you some of the memorials and features at "Utah" beach, most of the pictures are self explanatory, so I won't ramble on about them. The hall of honour, built within a captured German bunker, (this was closed off by a locked gate, probably to prevent vandalism from mindless English teenagers.) The main Cenotaph (obelisk) The memorial dedicated to the men of the US Navy. The long (thankfully) silent guns of the enemy... and the memorial in the background.... .......Being reclaimed by the beach.... once a scene of utter chaos catastrophe and murder.. now ..... just a beach. Other relics, dotted about outside the visitor centre...
After spending an hour or so wandering around Utah beach we moved on to Omaha, this is the beach that they represented in the opening scene of "Saving Private Ryan". It is quite difficult to imagine the wall of resistance that met the troops, but a lot of the coastline has been changed over the years, in fact some of the new roads are the ones laid by the engineers to further aid the subsequent landings of machinery and equipment. The newer steel memorial, is meant to reprsent the ships that hte liberators crossed in it also represents those ships and lives torn to pieces as part of the invasion. This is how the sea front looks today.... This wee gap between the hotel and the construction atop the hill was the scene of the worst of the casualties, it was literally a site of massacre. An upward looking view of the memorial to the lives lost at this spot.
Pointe du Hoc... Located 7 miles west of Vierville sur Mer, Pointe du Hoc is best known for the assault made on it by the US 2nd Ranger Battalion under the command of Col. James Earl Rudder. There it was feared the Germans had fortified six 155-mm artillery emplacements on the cliffs which overlooked the landing beaches. These guns would enable artillery fire to be directed over both Omaha and Utah approaches, undoubtedly causing massive casualties in the landing forces. Although there were several aerial bombardments intelligence reports assumed that the fortifications were too strong, and would also require attack by ground forces. The US 2nd Ranger Battalion was therefore given the task of destroying the strongpoint. The plan called for the three companies of Rangers to be landed by sea at the foot of the cliffs, scale them using ropes, ladders, and grapples under enemy fire, and engage the enemy at the top of the cliff. This was to be carried out before the main landings. The Rangers trained for the cliff assault on the Isle of Wight and Spean Bridge in Scotland, under the direction of British Commandos and used London Fire Brigade ladders and rocket propelled grappling hooks with rope ladders attached during the assault. Despite initial setbacks due to weather and navigational problems, resulting in a 40-minute delay and loss of surprise, the cliffs were scaled and the strongpoint was assaulted successfully, with relatively light casualties. Fire support was provided during the attack by several nearby Allied destroyers. However it was discovered that the main objective of the assault, the artillery battery, had been moved out of position, possibly as a result of air attacks during the buildup to the invasion. It is said that German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel himself gave the order to move the battery as he had recently been placed in charge of the coastal defenses of Normandy. Removal of the guns had actually been completed on June 4, 1944, and poor weather conditions prior to the invasion limited a final reconnaissance effort which would have revealed the guns removal. The Rangers regrouped at the top of the cliffs, and a few went off in search of the guns, tracking them down far inland and destroying them. This new battery location inland was sighted solely for Utah beach. The costliest part of the battle for the Rangers came after the cliff assault. Determined to hold the high ground, yet isolated from other assault forces, they fended off several German counterattacks over the next two days, until reinforced from Omaha Beach. The original plans called for an additional, larger Ranger force of eight companies to follow the first attack, if successful. Flares from the clifftops were to signal this second wave to join the attack, but because of the delayed landing, the signal came too late, and the other Rangers, mostly of the US 5th Ranger Battalion, landed on Omaha instead of Pointe du Hoc. At the end of the 3-day action, the landing force of 225+ was reduced to about 90 men who could still fight. Bomb craters, left as a reminder. In the background, you can see the memorial unveiled and deicated by Pres. Reagan. The next day we set off to visit Sword, Gold and Juno beaches, however, we were a little pressed for time so this became a wee bit of a whistlestop tour. When we passed through the outskirts of Bayeux, we (literally) rode through this, the main road runs through it.. Bayeux Commonwealth Cemetary. A very touching addition.... another touching addition....
The next stop was the gun battery at Longues sur Mer, which was captured by the Devonshire regiment. This battery was captured intact and contrary to orders, two of the captors decided to try and fire one of the guns. The result was catastrophic and as you can see one of the battery elements is totally destroyed.. sadly the two tommies were killed in the blast also. Jeff and Paul..... posing Next stop was Arromanches, this is the Westernmost end of Gold beach, this is where the Mulberry harbours were erected to facilitate the landings/disembarkation of the remainder of the materiel support for the war effort. This simple concept (by Sir Winston Churchill himself), is reckoned to be the foundation for the subsequent successes after D-Day and possibly the cornerstone for the war. Not bad for a bunch of rafts eh?
Okay, after Arromanches we went down the coast to Juno beach, at this point time was running against us so it was literally just a whistle-stop visit as we still had 180 miles to cover on this day and it was already 3pm, anyway..... Juno. The tank at Juno is a british built Churchill Mortar thrower, this landed at ther beach and began it's journey inland, 100 metres from the beach it ran into a bomb crater and became stranded. Six members of the crew were killed whilst trying to escape from the stricken vehicle. Subsequently a bridge was run over the top of the tank to give the following forces a reasonably firm route through the craterfield. The tank remained buried at that spot until the late 1970's when it was excavated and partial restoration put it into the condition you see today, where it remains as a memorial to those engineers who lost thier lives. Two of the original crew members were present at the dedication ceremony. Now we resume the journey to Abbeville, next to Amiens, time has beaten us to Sword beach and the Pegasus bridge, we will get to them next time. So on the route to Amiens, we crossed a couple of astounding bridges, quite a surprise! This one first..... Which was a pretty impressive climb, then just as I reached the top of the bridge I spotted this one in the distance... Yehaaa! Well, after a very wet trip to Abbeville, we actually got drenched and we left wet gloves on the hotel room heater, then went out to eat. We came back about 2 hours later and the room was like a sauna, I am not exaggerating, the room was completely full of steam..... and it stunk! Nyway next morning was to Amiens, a wee bit of a disappointment because the museum we wanted to visit was closed for lunch.. and being as we were against the clock for everything we had to skip it, however, the lady at reception allowed us to wander around the well presented reception area. We must bear in mind that we are now in a predominantly WW1 region and as such, there is very little evidence left to see with the exception of the museums. Some of the more notable attractions were a little out of reach for us, this was mainly due to the fact that we only had one day per region. So a lot of what I have for you now on is museum exhibits.
On we go..... The village of Albert, just outside Amiens, which was a real tough action zone during the Great war This is the entrance to the museum, it is an entrance to an underground tunnel system which was used as a bunker in WW1 and an air raid shelter in WW2. This is a picture of the church in the centre of the village this was decimated during WW1 and was completely restored between the wars, in WW2 it suffered no further damage as the occupying forces had no battles here.
We then followed part of the "Circuit of remembrance" which took us through some of the sites of the fiercest of the Somme battlefields. I kid you not everytime you turned your head, and sometimes when you didn't you were confronted with sights like this..... Closer.... The entire countryside is peppered with commonwealth war graves..... On to Poziers, the scene of a particularly bloody battle... Particularly poignant... Brothers in arms.... Further down the "Poppy trail" to Thiepval, once again the scene of atrocious fighting, after the war to mark this spot it was decided to erect a monument to recognise those whose bodies were never discovered or identified, carved all around the monument are the names of these poor souls. Incredibly breathtaking.... ....and we think one of Buster's ancestors... J. Halliday, West Yorks. Regt. whoa.. moving. More at Thiepval... Unknown Frenchmen... Unknown Brits... As I walking away from the main monument at Thiepval, I looked over to my left and spotted a smaller memorial stone and look in the background.....
The last destination for today was the village of Rancour, it is the only village in the region that has a cemetary from each of the combative nations, Britain, France and Germany. On the way there we passed this fellow at one of the crossroads, representing the Scottish Highland regiments, who were the prevalent British forces in that area. Then on to the French cemetary at Rancour. Directly across the road was the British cemetary, this also has 3 Airmen from WW2 Then we visited the German cemetary.. Each of the German stones represents four souls.. The German Remembrance plaques... Closer.... This shot was taken to show the german cemetary in the foreground and the British and French sites in the background. (The French graves are in the churchyard).
The following day, we went to Passchendaele - now renamed Passendale. The village was wiped from the face of the map during hostilities, after the war and the inhabitants returned to a blood soaked mud bath, which was once their home, they decided to rebuild and rename. To our Canadian cousins... And just over to the the east of the Canadian memorial stone..... Next, Tyne cot cemetary, well the intro plaque tells it better than me.. One of the German bunkers, there are five of these within the walls of the cemetary, they decided to make the burial place, where most of the troops fell. Part of the visitor centre recreation... The three Victoria Cross winners, within the cemetary.
The final part of the trip took us to the Passchendaele museum in Zonnebeke Outside the museum there are two pillboxes, excavated from the fields and dropped outside the museum, obviously the two turkeys haven't always been there! During WW1 the Germans were still employing armour to protect their men, something I didn't know until this trip... and the armoured troops would be manning one of these.. Models of bunkers which have been excavated but deemed to hazardous to maintain. Stormtroopers, a concept developed by the German army during WW1, highly trained, lightly equipped and very manouverable troops, with a specific target for each mission, rather than the previous, 'Blanket' point & shoot. a sense of what the trench would have been like .....and into the british bunker..... The armourer.. The surgery. The bunkspace. The French and (Left) the Belgian soldiers. Artefacts.. Well that's about it from me on this trip. Please feel free to use any of my pictures as you see fit, I only ask that if you do, they are accorded the appropriate respect. I do have quite a few more pictures, but really, how many pictures of Graveyards do you want to see? I will make a couple of more postings including random - fun- pictures. If anyone has any questions or would like some more pics, feel free to PM/e-mail me, I will be happy to help in whatever way I can. Thanks for taking the time to look at, what was a very interesting trip.
