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rickandsuejohnson

118 Blog Entries
9 Trips
1351 Photos

Trips:

The island of birth for 'Le petit caporal' and the roots of Bernard Nobili
From the Shire to Middle Earth and back
Two Thumbs up for the Canucks
Venice of the North - St Petersburg
Hungary anyone?
Argentat de nouveau
Go west, then go west some more.
Go West then go East
Paying our respects

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Waterfalls and a new game

Waterloo, Canada

We see on the news this morning that Toronto had a number of lightening strikes, some on the CN Tower and one setting fire to 5 townhouses. It is easy to underestimate the power of Nature.

Rang Ben when we woke to wish him a Happy Birthday. He was having lunch in a pub with Ellie, Freddie & Mary at the time.


Waterfall
On a day with lowering clouds threatening rain, a moderate 25 degrees and high humidity we went to Hamilton 'City of Waterfalls' according to the tourism website. Only they do not appear to be in Hamilton as much as Dundas, they do not appear to be signposted much if at all and the only local we spoke to was very vague about their whereabouts.

Waterfall
We managed after much searching with reference to the web courtesy of Ollie's Blackberry to find only two because the map on the website is insufficiently detailed. Nice as they were, it was a bit of an anti-climax having expected to have a 'fall fest' and as it kept threatening imminent rain, we had to have our waterproofs to hand! We consoled ourselves somewhat with a late lunch at Timmy Hor-tons.

Back in Kitchener, we popped in to Ollie's new workplace to be welcomed by owner Mike and dog Max. Apparently Max is a shrewd judge of character and chooses who he lets in – fortunately he seemed satisfied with us. Zoe would particularly like Max; he is just like a small polar bear cub and quite gorgeous. Mike made us very welcome and Ollie introduced us to the team who were there. They were all very welcoming to us and took time out of their work to have a chat; it seemed to me to be a really great environment in which to work. It turns out that Lisa, the editor-in-chief of Canadian Skies, one of the MHM magazines, has a next door neighbour who is on the organising committee for the Waterfalls of Hamilton and could have got us a map!! Just before leaving we chatted to Mike about our plans for NS. He knows it well and gave us a number of very useful pointers. I am not surprised that Ollie enjoys working there.

In the evening we went to watch Ollie & Ang play 'Ultimate Frisbee'. Never having seen a frisbee used in anger, I was expecting all sorts of arcane rules but mostly it made sense. Think netball meets association football (interperson passing) meets rugby football (running angles and scoring zone) and you get close. The frisbee is passed from a standing position to a runner who has to stop and pass it on to another attacker; defenders attempt to obstruct or interrupt the pass, success leading to a change of ownership. Frisbee not being caught results in a change. The objective being to get the frisbee from one end of the pitch to the other with the last catcher being in the end-zone (try scoring area). It was very interesting and frankly rather more exciting than the professional entertainment offered the previous night. Although very much a team game, it was nice that our team members contributed 3points to the winning 15-3 score.

permalink written by  rickandsuejohnson on July 27, 2012 from Waterloo, Canada
from the travel blog: Go West then go East
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A Distillery and a washout

Toronto, Canada


Miniature Railway
Another beautiful blue sky and an hour on the motorway network to Toronto and a cruise around to find parking near the Blue Jays stadium. We headed off in the direction of the CN Tower, skirting the Railway Museum with its miniature children's railway, towards the historic Distillery district, original the site of industrial units now used as a microbrewery, craft shops and restaurants. Ol hailed a taxi and 10 minutes later we were there.

Distillery district
First stop lunch at a micro brewery – 2 huge 'Starters' for us all to share. Ang and I left the men to another beer and headed off to look in a couple of the boutique galleries. The prices were also 'boutique'. A shop selling old household nik naks was asking $135 for a rusty old bird cage; $595 for a 1960s office stool! Mental note – if your shop is in a 'trendy' area you can ask silly prices. The jewellery, clothes, ceramics were lovely and were very unusual but, even taking into consideration the time taken to make them, they were hugely over priced (small filigree metal work earrings at $245).


Waterside
We headed off towards the lakeside from the Distillery district on our way back to the stadium. The whole area is being rejuvenated with high rise apartment blocks under construction on the edge of the lake. As we neared the centre some of the development had been completed and included a lovely water park and sandy beach area.


Blue Jays Stadium
An early meal at Wayne Gretsky's restaurant full of hockey memorabilia, before the game. We noticed that the roof had been closed – did this mean they expected rain? Well we didn't bring the Blue Jays luck. They lost 16-0 in a three hour game with Oakland Athletics. It was a great experience. The height some of those balls reached before hurtling into the crowd was impressive! Heavy rain greeted us as we reached the exit. What to do as none of us had coats or an umbrella? In the end Rick suggested we go back into the stadium and walk round to the Radisson Hotel and get a taxi. He wasn't the only one with this idea ,so Ol volunteered to get the car and meet us there. Within a quarter of an hour we were back on the motorway with sheet lightening illuminating the skyline as we left the city and buckets of rain making it a tricky drive for Ol. Home safely and in bed a little after 1am!

permalink written by  rickandsuejohnson on July 26, 2012 from Toronto, Canada
from the travel blog: Go West then go East
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A quiet day

Waterloo, Canada


Anniversary dinner
Sue & I wished each other a Happy Anniversary and were astonished to see as we opened each other's cards that we had chosen identical cards. What does that mean? Spooky and perhaps worrying.

A relatively relaxed day, Ollie & I went to borrow Dave's car to pick up some chests of drawers he & Ang had bought from the other side of Waterloo. They were so large we had to make two trips but soon had them stashed downstairs.

After a nice lunch of fresh baguette, salami & cheese we went to Heidelberg where Sue had seen an inexpensive B&B on the net. I guess you get what you pay for!


O guage train
We called at a fascinating farm shop on the way back; all sorts of produce and an O gauge electric train set running around the roof.


Borealis Grill
In the evening we went to a restaurant for our anniversary meal; a former school House with an interesting decorated metal relief ceiling. I started with a delightful leek, potato & bacon soup while the others shared a huge tandoori Chicken flatbread. Sue followed with halibut and the rest of us had 'Brick Chicken' – a huge portion of Chicken cooked under a brick. It was very tasty and we finished off with a special coffee with Grand Marnier and maple syrup. A really lovely evening.

permalink written by  rickandsuejohnson on July 25, 2012 from Waterloo, Canada
from the travel blog: Go West then go East
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Hot Hot Hotter

Waterloo, Canada


Craft Beer & Ribfest (craft beer section)
Off to a Rib Fest around lunch time in Victoria Park, central Kitchener. Tokens bought, we charged our sampling glasses and headed for the shade. A huge range of craft beer stands bordered one side of the central area of the park (porters, light and dark ales, lagers and fruit flavoured beers!); stands selling ribs, chicken and huge onions dipped in batter vied with one another on the other. Large tables sporting trophies from past glories fronted some of the latter.

Craft Beer & Ribfest (ribfest section)
This was a serious business. It seemed the more trophies that were displayed the larger the queue line. Ol and Rick headed off and decided a half rib from the stand with the shortest line was a good idea. Good choice boys – the judges agreed with you – it beat the established trophy holders hands down!

Craft beer appreciation society

A couple of hours had passed under the trees and a pleasant breeze was building up along with the cloud cover. We decided to take a walk in the park away from the fest. The sky had turned a steely grey – better head back to the car we thought as a few large drops of rain fell on the lake. Car reached, the heavens briefly opened. No sign that there had been any when we got back home. Ol and Ang's friends and previous near neighbours, Steph and Dave, arrived to share the evening with us. It was great to get to know them.

Sunset in Waterloo

Temperatures predicted to rise even higher today so after a leisurely start we headed off to West Montrose to see the oldest covered bridge in Ontario and the town where Bill Tutt one of the Bletchley Park code breakers settled after the war. He was invited to became a professor of Mathematics at Toronto in 1948 and then moved to nearby University of Waterloo in 1962. He returned briefly to Newmarket, his place of birth, after the death of his wife in 1994 but the call of his adopted homeland brought him back to Ontario.


City Centre
On to Guelph and after a brief stop for lunch at Pitta Pit (great value and really tasty) we reached John McCrae's House (place of birth) and now a small museum dedicated to his memory and to those whom he treated as a Colonel in the Canadian Medical corps in the Great War.

John MaCrea Birthplace
It is thought that he wrote 'In Flanders Fields' following the death of a great friend in 1915. We had visited 'Essex Road' one of the dressing stations where Col McCrae had worked and had written the poem when we stayed near Ypres last summer but both of us had assumed that he had been killed from shelling. Not so - apparently he had suffered badly from asthma throughout his life and contracted pneumonia while working at a Field Hospital near Boulogne. Meningitis took hold and he died only a few days later in January 1918.

A detour to look at a possible rental for next May on our way to the very small museum in the local bakery dedicated to Lucy Maud Montgomery (Anne of Green Gables) at Norval. Norval was the second place in Ontario where Maud's husband Ewan was minister. Back home to delicious barbecued steaks and corn on the cob!

permalink written by  rickandsuejohnson on July 24, 2012 from Waterloo, Canada
from the travel blog: Go West then go East
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At the start

Waterloo, Canada


Downtown approach from the air (CN Tower in background)
Arrived at the terminal for 10 and found the queue for Air Transat. While substantial, it was not horrendously long and we soon found ourselves at a check in desk where we had to have our hand baggages checked for weight and tagged prior to checking in the hold cases. It was worth the time spent making sure that we were within limits! We went straight to security and were again surprised to find no long queues; we were through quite quickly albeit directed by a guard who had had a recent charisma bypass and was still recovering from the surgery..

In the departure lounge we were amazed to find that there were seats available and that the bar area wasn't packed. We took the opportunity to nab a couple of comfy seats and grab a nice bacon bap and pint. Our gate wasn't announced until and hour before departure and we were beginning to think we would be facing a delay again but this was unfounded. Nevertheless, by the time it was announced the airport had filled considerably.

Having booked seats at the front of cattle class, we were among the last to be called to board. The bloke in front of me chose to put his trainers under his seat rather than the seat in front which gave me little room for manoeuvre and after gentle hints by pushing didn't work I gave up subtlety and just trampled on them.

In the isle seats one row back from us there was a family with a small boy of about 2½. Apart from not enjoying being strapped in for take off and landing (which meant he couldn't be easily comforted), he was very well behaved. We couldn't help but think of Zoe, Neil, Ben & Ellie next may and hope it goes as well for them.

We had a good flight with only a small amount of turbulence for a short while and enjoyed the in-flight service. Having left in sunshine, we flew over cloud for most of the way with only occasional breaks to see the atlantic. The coast of Canada was under cloud and there was no break for about an hour before the coastline of the St Lawrence began to emerge. We flew in to Toronto in slightly hazy sunshine to be met by Ollie and Ang 25 minutes early having passed through border control without problem, though lack of charisma seems to be contagious among customer facing staff.

The temperature was a low 27degrees C as we stepped out of the airport and made our way to the car. A short hour or so later and we were sitting outside Ollie & Ang's house sipping sangria and enjoying the late afternoon sunshine.

Early (?) to bed at 9 when our bodies were grumbling that it was 2.

permalink written by  rickandsuejohnson on July 22, 2012 from Waterloo, Canada
from the travel blog: Go West then go East
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A walk around Lille

Lille, France


The trains
Today we went to Lille. We caught the train at Bailleul station; BR take note – parking was free for the day, the train was on time at Bailleul and at Lille, although not exactly cheap, comfortable and clean. A double decker, it was a good vantage point on the upper deck for seeing the countryside. We were issued with our 'Billet a composter' – but this is not some cunning recycling scheme; it just means you have to have the ticket punch validated before you get on the train. On arrival at Lille, we made for the Metro and bought a day ticket as this is what the guide book suggests.
The metro is excellent, along the lines of the Docklands light Railway but Lille is quite a compact city and unless you are going beyond the centre, I don't think it is needed at all. Having got off the metro outside the tourist office we discovered that we had only travelled a couple of hundred metres! The tourist office had a useful booklet in English with suggested walking tours round the centre.

Place de General de Gaulle
We booked the city bus tour to get an overview but our trip would not be 'till mid-afternoon so we started on one of the walking tours, taking us through the old and historic centre. Lille has had an eventful 1000 years since foundation in 1066, presumably in celebration of the leaving from Normandy of a certain Duke. It developed as a centre of business between Flanders and the fairs in Champagne. Originally owned by the Dukes of Flanders, economically it was linked with England and the Holy Roman Empire and French kings took a fancy to it.

Place de General de Gaulle
Some carefully arranged political marriages didn't prevent King Philippe August of France engineering control early in the 13th C. However, a marriage of a daughter of Flanders to a Burgundian meant that Lille, along with Brussels and Dijon became part of the Burgundian state in 1363. Another marriage took Burgundy under Habsburg control and subsequently, Spanish in the 1600's. However, a marriage into the Spanish family by Louis XIV in 1663, gave him the opportunity to lay claim to the low countries; he reinforced the claim by laying seige to Lille which resisted for all of 9 days.
Now French, Austria had a crack at it in 1792 but gave up after leaving a few cannonballs embedded in the stonework. During both 1st and 2nd Wws, Lille was overrun by the German Army.

Our walk round the town started appropriately enough at the tourist office which is in what is left of the Palais Rihour built in the 15th C for the Duke of Burgundy, much of this burned down in 1916.


Old Bourse
The Place du General de Gaulle (born in Lille in 1890) is a huge square ringed with elegant buildings, the eye being drawn quickly to the Vieille Bourse as a particularly ornamented building. The building was only restored to its former splendour in 1995 and does look good. Walking though the building, the interior courtyard is filled with 2nd hand booksellers and such but you can see where the marketers would have had their stalls as the walls are labelled – chemicals, mechnical engineering etc..

Opera
On through the old bourse and you come to the place du Theatre with the Theatre itself very in-your-face and surmounted with a huge bas-relief of Apollo and muses. The nearby Chambre de Commerce has a 76 metre high belfry. At the end of the 17th C, Lille managed to acquire a set of town planners who insisted on some homogeneity and required that any facade proposed to be submitted to them for approval.

Chamber of Commerce
This has had the effect of suppressing individuality and led to unusual uniformity of the buildings from this time around the square. Some of the houses here still have the cannonballs embedded in the walls from the battle of 1792. Shame they didn't present the town planners for target practice.

Rue de la Bourse, with cannon balls
I noticed a number of roofs with rooflights and with dormer windows both of which spoiled the line of the roof but undoubtedly enhanced both the accommodation and interest of the building. Just as well there weren't any British planners then! From here we made our way down Rue de la Grande Chaussee with elegant buildings to the strangely named Rue des Chats Bossus. Apparently this is named after an old tanner's sign but this does not really explain why the cats are humpbacked. Perhaps some things are best left unsaid.

L'Huitiere, Rue des chats bossus
In said street, there is an unusual restaurant called l'Huitiere. Heavily decorated in mosaic tiles in an art deco style, it looked splendid. It was closed during the holiday season, so presumably doesn't much care for tourists. Proceeding up the Rue de monnaie, where there used to be a mint, we saw the impressive building originally a Hospital (1692) and now a museum.

Vieux Murs Peterink
Further up the road we went down Rue au Peterinck which has a real feel of taking you back in time, it is lined by small houses once used by weavers. They had workshops on the 1st floor and traded from the ground floor. Near the end of this is the cathedral of Notre Dame de la Treille.

Cathedrale de Notre dame de la Treille
The guide book describes its 'fine harmonious facade dating to 1999' – I can only say that there must be times when town planners go to sleep on the job. About the only word I can agree apart from the date is 'facade'.

Having worked up an appetite, we decided to take a beak from cultural activities and feed the inner person. We found a nice restaurant offering moules frites and placed our order.


Moules frites
Shortly after we were presented with the most enormous bowls of mussels and a lovely bowl of chips. With our upbringing we scoffed the lot and felt very full for some time after. Back to the tourist office for our 3pm bus tour. Well, it was interesting and we did see some things we hadn't seen on our walk but I'm afraid that there wasn't much that we couldn't have covered if we had continued walking for another 40 minutes.

Porte de Paris ca 1690
We wanted to get some tourist mementos but in all the touring we did, hadn't seen anything other than the small shop in the tourist Info Office. We had a little and abortive search before going back to the station for our trip back to Bailleul. The train came in and we climbed aboard. It was incredibly hot inside and it didn't get any better when we left (on time) or at any point on the trip. We were relieved to get off and cool down in the car on the way back to the site.


Deegeur encore

Deegeur
While we were in Lille we managed to see something that would be of particular interest to Freddie and Alfie, so we were pleased to be able to record them. We also saw several Fireman Sam wagons but by the time we were able to record it, they had gone. Sorry about that!

permalink written by  rickandsuejohnson on August 17, 2011 from Lille, France
from the travel blog: Paying our respects
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Vimy Ridge and a search for an ace

Vimy, France


Memorial on the ridge
Being a public holiday we decided not to go the quickest way via the autoroute to Vimy but took the back roads passing several monuments on the D947 from Estaires to the Lens by pass – the Indian Memorial at La Bombe followed quickly by the Portuguese Military Cemetery. Heading south as the A21 then A211 become the N17 you pass Avoin and as the road curves round to the right you get your first sight of the two gleaming white pillars on the ridge from the road. At Vimy-Givenchy-en-Gohelle you start your climb to the summit and the huge memorial park, gifted by the people of France in perpetuity to Canada.

Canadian memorial
The monument itself has, in the last few years, been completely renovated. The statues were removed (they are in sections) and cleaned and many of the stones that form the base and rise by a steps to the pillars were replaced by the nearest that could be found that matched the original and were of suitable quality from Croatia. The base is carved with the names of the 11,285 officers and men who died in France and have no known graves.

Bronze map of lines
To the right and back from the monument is a bronze plaque showing the Canadian and German lines prior to the battle at Vimy Ridge on 19 April 1917. Driving a half a mile or so to the east of the monument on a road through the park with the pine woods either side, cordoned off with warnings of danger (unexploded mines), you reach another car park with access to the Welcome Centre and sections of the trenches and tunnels which can be visited.


Preserved trenches
The Centre is staffed by young Canadians and our guide a young student from Winnepeg, Manitoba took us through the Canadian and German trenches. The Grange Tunnel wasn't open due to flooding from the recent heavy rains. At this point the German and Canadian trenches were only a few 100 metres apart. A labyrinth of tunnels leading up to the ridge (most about a mile long) allowed soldiers to rally in relative safety prior to action. Mines were blown in the middle of no man's land and then the Canadians surged forward to dig in near the German front lines. From here they launched their attack and eventually pushed forward to take the ridge an important strategic point commanding the Douia plain. We were able to go in the trenches and view a step off point.


French National Memorial & Cemetery
Retracing our steps to Givenchy we took the road to Notre Dame de Lorette, the French National Memorial and Cemetery. The cemetery covers 62 acres and holds nearly 40,000 graves. As well as a basilica the cemetery has a lighthouse tower. At night apparently a searchlight at its top constantly rotates and shines. The basilica, roman in style, stands on the spot where a church once stood.

tower, French National Memorial
There is a very ornate and beautiful mosaic of Christ with outstretched arms behind the altar and stained glass windows either side of the nave. Between the basilica and the tower there is the base for a perpetual flame which wasn't lit on the day that we visited. Unlike the British cemeteries the graves are marked with crosses not tablets of stone. I wondered what would happen if you were Jewish and then I saw a single tablet in a row of crosses marked with the star of David and I had my answer.

We crossed the road to the orientation tablet and from there we confirmed what Rick had already guessed, the relative position of Vimy. This ridge also held a commanding view of the Douai plain.


Captain Ball's grave
I'd noticed when we were planning the day that Rose Coombs' book had suggested a detour to visit the grave and crash site of Captain Alan Ball, a young man from Lenton, Nottingham. Britain's highest scoring fighter ace who achieved 44 victories before Lothar Von Richthofen (Manfred's brother) claimed to have shot him down (despite apparently actually being forced to the ground himself seconds before with a punctured fuel tank having been chased by Ball into a cloud) near Anoeullin, north west of Lens. He was only 20 when he died and there was apparently no evidence of battle wounds.

Captain Ball crash site
The current theory is that he got disorientated in the cloud and emerged upside down at 200 feet with no room for manoeuver. Since we had taken the trouble to visit Manfred's crash site it seemed only right that we should do so for Alan. We found his grave easily enough from the directions in the book but spent 45 mins or so trying to locate the crash site. Just as we found it we were about to pull in when the car in front of us pulled to a halt. The lady driver got out and asked us if we were looking for Alan's grave. Bless her, she had seen the GB number plate and guessed that we were looking for him. The village or, I should say, small town of Annouellin hasn't forgotten him. They named their College after him in 1999 and I understand that to this day his grave is still tended by relatives of Mme Cecille Deloffre, a young Frenchwoman who ran to Ball's aid in his final moments.

Marker stone with Cemetery in distance to left of the large building
The crash site itself is not marked at the roadside and is in a field of potatoes some way in near a small copse; although marked by a stone, the crops are planted right up to the stone so it is difficult to see but from here you can see the cemetery only a few hundred yards away. He is not forgotten in Nottingham either apparently as he has a statue in Nottingham Castle and a display in the museum there.

Nearing 7 pm so we decided to chance the shorter motorway route back to the campsite. Lucky we weren't going in the opposite direction back to Lille from Dunkerque as the traffic for a large section from junction 6 to 9 was at a virtual standstill!

permalink written by  rickandsuejohnson on August 16, 2011 from Vimy, France
from the travel blog: Paying our respects
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Menin Gate and The Last Post but perhaps not ours

Ieper, Belgium


Cloth hall without fair
After another exciting and full day yesterday, we had a day of relative peace today. Shopping at midday and then early evening off to Ieper to see the last post, which is sounded every night at the Menin Gate at 8pm. We aimed for a car park near the Groot markt making sure that this was a recognised place to park. Yet again, we found that the meters were explained in Flemish only and not speaking the language, deciphering the terms was impossible. This is rather surprising as Belgium has 3 official languages, you would have thought that the sign might be in each. Bearing in mind that Ieper is heavily frequented by Brits, you may have expected some concession to this too. All the locals seem to speak English and they are unfailingly helpful and generous and if addressed in English will translate for you. In the event, we discovered that the parking meters finished collecting at 6:30 in the evening, after which it was free until the following morning! Since it was 7 by then we had a free session. And the car was still there when we got back!


House in Grotte Markt
We walked the short distance to the Menin gate where numbers were already beginning to gather. Shortly after, a contingent of (British) cadets arrived and mustered on the pavement outside the gate.

Buglers, Menin Gate
Just before 8, the police arrived and closed off the road on either side and allowed the crowd to go into the road on the town side. The cadets marched to the outside across the road and four buglers, presumably former Belgian Army soldiers marched to the centre of the outer part of the gate facing the town and played the last post. Some wreathes were laid and then the buglers sounded reveille. It was quite a moving experience and as Sue commented was a suitable finale to the battlefields part of our trip.

permalink written by  rickandsuejohnson on August 16, 2011 from Ieper, Belgium
from the travel blog: Paying our respects
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Messines area and street fairs

Messines, Belgium


Street market
The day started with a visit to Boescheppe to see a show of draught horses doing their thing pulling logs, carts and ploughing etc. We decided to be clever and use the back roads to get there, which was a mistake as all the approaches from our direction were 'deviation'! We managed to find somewhere on the far side of the small town to park and walked in. There we discovered the problem. They were having a combined street market and car boot sale and the whole of Flanders was invited; most of them accepting the invitation. The masses of stalls had everything catered for and there were some tempting articles. There was no sign of the promised horses so we went back to the car and decided to go on to the Messines ridge that was our next objective.

Working horse
Reasoning that if the horses were somewhere in the vicinity, they were likely to be on the outskirts, we motored around the remainder of the place just in case. Sure enough at the furthest point, there they were, large as life – well actually roughly twice life sized. We were directed to a large and rather muddy field whose corn had been cut very recently indeed and I was duly grateful for traction control which gave me the confidence to have our underside thoroughly scrubbed by the stubble while clogging up the wheel arches with mud. Walking from the car to the show itself across same field was another experience; every time you trod on a bit of stubble, it released the rainwater it had stored from the heavy rain of the previous night straight up your leg as soon as you lifted your foot.

Draught horse display
It was a joy, however to see the draught horses in action, although less so to see one trainer with his beautiful greys making them walk over a stairway made of hay bales just to show that he could. It seemed rather pointless to me and unnatural. In the field, there were horse doing what they should, pulling carts, logs and ploughs demonstrating great skills from both horse and driver.

Island of Ireland Memorial
Off then to Messines ridge and our first stop at the Island of Ireland Memorial commemorating protestant and roman catholic soldiers who fought as one against a common enemy.
On to Ploegsteert where we saw the memorial to Winston Churchill's service near there in WW1 and thence to Hyde Park Corner and H Charlton-Bradshaw's Ploegsteert Memorial to the Missing on opposite sides of the road.

British memorial to the missing of Messines ridge
The Missing in this case are from the battles of Armentieres, Aubers Ridge, Loos, Fromelles, Estaires, Hazebrouck, Scherpenberg and Outtersteene Ridge; some 11,367 men.

Memorial to unofficial Xmas truce 1914, Messines church in background
Near here is the simple wooden cross erected in 1999 to mark one of the spots where the unofficial Christmas 1914 truce took place. In to Messines (Mesen) and the New Zealand Memorial to the Missing and British Cemetery on the ridge itself with a commanding view of the countryside beyond. From here we made our way to Mount Kemmel, a steep hill with an understandably desirable outlook. On the slopes of this is the French Ossuary – a mass grave of 5,294 soldiers, only 57 of whom are known by name.

Ossuary of French unknown on Mount Kemmel
At the top is the French monument to those who died in Belgium.
Our next stop was at the site of the Lone Tree Crater, one of the craters left by the mines of 1917; now transformed into the Pool of Peace. I can't help feeling that it is wishful thinking that dedicating something that was so hugely destructive into a sentiment such as this will make anyone think twice about war. Quite apart from anything else, we are still quite primal and once threatened will strike to try to remove that threat rather than rationalise it.

Pool of Peace in Lone Tree crater
Once struck the other party will retaliate to show that it cannot be dominated in that way and before long a war has started. Plenty of people understand this and work on it to achieve their own ends. What we as human beings would do well to master is the art of communication without agenda.
Our way back to the campsite was through Roteberg and Mont Noir villages. We came to a grinding halt at the edge of Mont Noir Village as the party had relocated itself from Boescheppe to Mont Noir. Swollen with the mass of the great unwashed that gatecrashed the party from the whole area between Paris and Brussels, the street was running with people – certainly not cars. Pedestrians did their best impression of invulnerability with gallic insouciance and cars somehow managed to avoid them but it took 12 minutes to cover ground that normally takes about 90 seconds.

permalink written by  rickandsuejohnson on August 14, 2011 from Messines, Belgium
from the travel blog: Paying our respects
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Hommelpap Microbrewery

Bailleul, France

Spent most of the day alternately irritating and amusing Sue with passages from Stephen Clark's '1000 years of annoying the French'.


Military Cemetery
Went a little early to Bailleul for the Brasserie Tour & meal that we had booked for 7pm and took the opportunity to visit the quite large cemetery in Bailleul itself. The military cemetery is an extension of the old town cemetery and contains the graves of German, French and BEF soldiers along with several Chinese Labour Corps. As Bailleul Hospital was a major casualty clearing station and hospital, I would guess that many of those interred here died of wounds. Our way to the brasserie from here was probably across an RFC aerodrome, as there was one near the town.


Bar at Hommelpap brauerie
The brasserie was a fairly typical microbrewery and we were taken to a field about 50 metres up the road to be shown hops growing, with an explanation of how much was under cultivation and tonnage produced which was converted into the amount of beer produced. As the animateur spoke softly and rapidly, I didn't catch any of the details and we had the same story as we had heard at the windmill about children starting school late in September so that they could help with the harvest. Back 50 metres down the road to the brewery for an explanation of the constituents of beer and how the hops were dried and why they were used in beer; again I didn't catch most of the detail and I probably only gathered what I did by being reasonably familiar with the process. The explanation took place in a small hallway about 5 metres by 4 with the brewery itself in a room about the same size next door through a glass partition. High tech it was not. To be honest it was a bit of an anti-climax.

Restaurant at Hommelpap brauerie
Once the tour was done, we went upstairs into a galleried area with tables and shown to our reserved table (pour deux Anglais). It was a lovely bucolic environment with open space above our heads provided by the roof timbers and with agricultural impedimenta supended from the beams and on the walls. The family all took part in the business; we suspect Grandpa and Grandma providing beer and direction respectively, grandchildren waiting on tables and Mum & Dad in the kitchen. We ate boeuf carbonnade au biere du maison avec des frites and it was truly magnificent. The beef was tender and tasty and the fries were really good. I had a barley wine aperitif with a distinct and very pleasant base of honey and Sue had one based on a rhubarb cordial with sparkling wine. The meal was washed down in my case with the brewery's own Hommelpap, while Sue had a pear juice She was driving back! We finished with coffee and had an altogether delightful evening. All for a very reasonable amount that should shame many more prestigious establishments; I have had many 'better' meals that have been exorbitant and I have not enjoyed as much.

On our way back we had a couple of surprised stares at our right hand drive and I felt the urge at the next car to throw my hands in the air in a 'look no hands gesture' as we approached, which caused some consternation to the oncoming car and amusement on mine; juvenile I know, but being looked at by people as though you have two heads can sometimes affect one that way.

permalink written by  rickandsuejohnson on August 13, 2011 from Bailleul, France
from the travel blog: Paying our respects
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