Days in Northern France

Well, we've made it to Banbridge, Northern Ireland. Whew! We'll just backtrack a bit, and post some of the pictures along the way to London. So we left Paris, and headed North on a train toward Amiens. The cemetery site of George Hunter is in Longueau, and we found out our train to Amiens actually stopped in Longueau first. So, we got off at the Longueau train station, planning to get a taxi to the cemetery site and find the gravestone. Now, Longueau is about the size of Sunderland, maybe, and nary a taxi was to be found. So, we had to start walking. Which way was the next question. We clearly were not in a "town". So we found a sign pointing to "Longueau" and off we went. As the rain clouds threatened above our heads, we finally came to a "main' road where I (Nancy) found a nice young girl and I stammered along in my broken French asking where the cemetery could be found. Of course, they had no idea what we were talking about. So we headed down the main street and knowing that the site was close to a major highway ahead of us, I was just hoping George would lead us there. Then, miraculously, as we were reaching the crest of a hill, over a hedgerow to our right, was a giant memorial cross! OH MY GOD I was so relieved. To be in the middle of nowhere Northern France, and to find exactly what we were looking for!! I was so excited I literally threw off my pack, starting jumping up and down and all my exhaustion from the walk (30+plus minutes, but seemed like forever) disappeared. JR was so elated he just sat down. We spent a while there, looking at all the grave stones and taking the important pictures. The site was so well maintained (as we saw all of them are) it was a really beautiful and thoughtful site. It was quite small, only 200 headstones, and most of them were British, but there were a handful of Canadians (George) and some Australian ones as well.
We left Longueau in a bit of a daze I think. Walking back to the train station full of thought... it was so incredible to see the site, and to think of what happened to these young men, literally stuck in hell on earth, made it all so real and meaningful to be alive and experiencing life.

At the train station we had a couple of hours before our train to Arras arrived. JR volunteered (gotta love him) to walk back into town to find some rations to hold us over for the next few hours. He came back with some sandwiches and juice and we ate and caught our train to Arras. Now, Arras was a much more lively than Longueau, and had taxis and hotels, and places to eat all over the place. Our taxi driver knew exactly where we wanted to go, and we able to get to the Vimy Memorial site quickly and easily. When we arrived, there was a Frenchman who kindly asked us how much time we had to view the site, and in saying only a few hours, he quickly radioed to the guides at the trench tours and was able to tell us to run "tout suite" to the trench area. So off we went, literally running down the road about 1 km to the entrance of the trenches and underground tunnels. Just as we were tiring, I looked over at JR and said, if the young guys could run with 60 pds on their backs, so can we! God were we tired when we got there! They were able to take our packs in the office and we met up with the rest of the tour group. The tour was great - learning and walking through the trenches, actually seeing how close the German and Canadian trenches were! (they could hear each other talking!) and to go underground and see where the officers and men waited before the attack on the ridge. After the tour, we went back to the top of the ridge were the massive Canadian monument stands as a remembrance and tribute to the 60,000 Canadian soldiers who were killed and remains are missing, or unaccounted for. As the monument has just completed years of restoration, it was magnificent. Luckily, JR and I had a few moments where we were alone on the hill, and he was able to get pictures without people running all over the statues.
Our taxi came and picked us up and off to the train station we went.

We left Arras totally silent, pondering everything we had taken in that day... it's hard to put into words, even now, so many days later. It was an experience both of us will never forget.

We arrived in Calais around 8pm that night, and found two young Australians, who had been denied entry into the UK as they had no proof of leaving (no exit ticket) so were turned over to the French police. The police had dropped them off at the station, but they were clueless as to what to do. They were so happy to have found people speaking English! I showed them how to operate the automated ticket machine, and got them tickets to inward France, as they wanted to eventually make it to Germany. Hope they made out ok!
We trekked along and eventually found our hotel, facing the Channel! WOW! Then the next morning we got up very early, walked to the ferry port, went through security and customs, and boarded the ferry! I must say, it was more packed than I had hoped and although I did get some great pictures of the Cliffs of Dover, one couldn't really stand on the top deck and bask in the sunshine. It was more of a small space the smokers were coveting and you couldn't squeeze in for too long. Alas, we saw the crisp, grandiose cliffs glimmering in the morning sun, and that was the whole point.

Once in Dover, we boarded a bus and picked Canterbury as our place to stay the night. Like we mentioned before - it was packed full of people and we were so relieved when we found a room at a Bed and Breakfast. Canterbury was beautiful; the cathedral majestic, the castle was superb, and the quaint streets and canals were like a fairytale town. We left Canterbury for London on Sunday and we'll put up at post about that next.

I'll end this post now, as I think it's been quite lengthy. JR will definitely put some pictures up later.

We're loving Northern Ireland right now, and last night I looked up the census from 1911 and found the Apsley family from Carrickfergus! I'll print out the info and bring it home!


Hope everyone is well!
love you all!