2geonomads

Monday 2nd November 2015.
As coffee at the hotel is 5 pounds and full breakfast is 24.50 we walk over to the airport terminal and 7.50 pounds gives us very good coffee and pastries for two!

Check out of the hotel at 12.00 am and take the Heathrow Express to the correct terminal.
Flight to Dohar leaves at 3.20 pm and we enjoy a very smooth trip. I hour stopover in Dohar and then on to the 10 hour flight to Perth. Get a few hours sleep in spite of about 30 minutes of fairly severe turbulence of which Gail has no recollection at all.
In-flight entertainment mediocre at best but a great documentary on the All Blacks and their legendary jersey. No wonder they are the Number One team in the world when all roads lead to Rugby in the country. According to the Kiwis the Rugby WC is by far the most important in the world. Seemingly the Olympics and the Football WC are on a par with the Busselton Jetty Swim!

Cheers until the next time

The Obese Ferret

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Sunday 1st November 2015

Up early again as we have to pack our bags, hand in the car and catch the train to St Pancras. In the meantime there is still much to see.

On yet another beautiful day we return to Thiepval where on 1st July 1916 100,00 inexperienced soldiers( Pals Battalions) went over the top with disastrous results. At the end of this first day of the Battle of the Somme ( known as ” the bloodiest day of the British Army) 60,000 British soldiers had become casualties. The German losses represent about 1/10 of this number. Thiepval was finally captured on 27th September 1916, retaken in March 1918 and finally recaptured by British troops in August 1918.

The British army suffered more than 420,000 casualties during the Battle of the Somme.

The magnificent Thiepval Memorial at 45 metres high is the largest British war memorial in the world and it commemorates more than 72205 men from British and South African armies who were declared missing in the Somme between July 1915 and March 1918. Either the bodies of these men were never found or the body could not be identified.

A 45 minute video at the Thiepval Visitor Centre gives a great overview of the Great War.

Pozieres is another name which resonates with many Australians and a village in Queensland took the name after the war.  At the Pozieres Milititary Cemetery 2700 soldiers are buried and 14,00 are commemorated on the surrounding walls.

It is also the site of a grassy hill called ‘ The Windmill’ and it was here in July and August  1916 that Australian troops lost more men than on any other battlefield during the war.

In the midst of all of the brutality of war it was heartening to read of Percy Cherry, an Australian captain, who took from the hands of a dying German officer a packet of letters to be sent to his family in Germany.

Before driving north to Calais we visit the understated but moving memorial  to the New Zealand Division who launched a successful attack on Flers in September 1916 and it is here that commemorations are held around Anzac Day each year.

We say farewell to the Somme area by visiting Rancourt which has the dubious and sad distinction of having three cemeteries, French ,German and British within its boundaries. The first two alone contain the remains of  20,000 soldiers, a very sombre note on which to end our unforgettable tour of this area.

It’s toll road time again for the drive up to Calais and we arrive at the TGV station and the Avis office in spite of our having been given incorrect directions. Finding a service station to fill up the car is a totally different matter and after driving down a number of minor roads and my passenger becoming very stressed out we decide to drop off the car with the tank only 3/4 full.

Waiting to go through Immigration we end up in the queue next to a drunk who looks, sounds and smells as if he has had a very long liquid lunch or perhaps week. However, he obviously sobers up enough ( or is very Oggy actor ) for the Immigration officials to let him through.

Unfortunately, another guy is not so fortunate and has a very tough time selling a convincing story to the officials.We last see him being taken to one side for further interrogation and  we suspect that he may not be leaving French shores today.

Arrive at St Pancras after a very speedy and comfortable train journey and then it’s on to the tube and Heathrow.

The Airport Sofitel is fine and we enjoy a very good light meal in the restaurant.

Before turning in I think back to our European sojourn and whilst nothing can outdo ‘ Rudey Leg Lies ‘ a few other things spring to mind.

Smoking- an incredible number of French and Spanish smoke, and the habit is particularly among young women.

Grenoble- this town was a huge disappointment as we had expected a pristine large ski centre servicing the surrounding resorts. Instead we saw pollution at a level seen nowhere else on our travels and a population seemingly lacking any pride in what could be an attractive city.

Autumn colours and the Champagne region- I had probably forgotten how glorious the Autumn colours can be and the rolling hills of the Champagne area were an absolute delight. Definitely must re-visit this region in the future.

The Futility of War- never have we been confronted by so many examples of the futility of war. However, we were constantly amazed by the way in which the French nationals expressed the huge debt of gratitude owed to the soldiers from overseas by never allowing the many memorials to deteriorate through neglect.

The Obese Ferret.

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Friday 30th October 2015

Start the day checking the match prior to our journey into the Somme region. Gail has marked one of the maps with various symbols and/or notes but she is not sure if  one particular site is a museum or a hotel. It should make for either very substandard accommodation or a decidedly boring museum.

Come what may Isabelle duly arrives at the agreed checkout time of 10.00 am and we say goodbye to this very stylish lady and her superb country house which we would have no hesitation in recommending to others.

We soon  find ourselves on a number of minor roads as we head north, bypassing the towns of Soissons, Chauny, and St Quentin. The early misty weather gradually clears and given the fairly mild temperatures we enjoy a pleasant, if unspectacular drive through the French countryside. By this stage we are both suffering from caffeine-withdrawal symptoms  but we have to wait until we reach the town of Peronne before we get our fix at the cafe close to the magnificent museum Historial of the Great War.

As we have to wait until the museum re-opens at 2pm we relax and enjoy the afternoon sun and our homemade salad roll outside the entrance.

We could not have asked for a better introduction to Somme area and we spend 3 very informative but thought-provoking hours at this great museum. The Historial unique collection  allows the visitor to see not only how the soldiers lived on and behind the front lines but also how the civilian population lived. We are taken into a special Australian section where a 30 minute self- guided tour complete with a virtual map and some very graphic footage shown on large screens certainly brings home to us the suffering of the soldiers and the horrors of war.

The museum was opened in 1992 and is still something of a work in progress but never was the futility of war better illustrated than in this memorable site. This visit certainly takes us back to a previous visit to Auschwitz Concentration Camp when the weather had been truly awful. Today it somehow doesn’t seem fitting that we should be viewing the hundreds of memorials similar to this one and the vast cemeteries that dot the countryside on this glorious sunny autumn day.

We eventually leave Peronne in a suitably sombre mood and make our way to Hotel de la Paix in the small town of Bapaume, which will be our home for the next two nights.

After dinner in the hotel restaurant we finish off the day by watching SA v Argentina. It’s one game too much for the Pumas and the Springboks prevail.

Cheers

The Obese Ferret

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Saturday 31st October 2015.

Up earlier than usual as our first destination is Villers Bretonneux, the large village which entered the history of the war  on 24th April 1918 when Australian troops finally halted the German offensive of March 1918.

The imposing white stone Australian National Memorial  was the last of the Great War national memorials of the British empire and Commonwealth to be built in France or Belgium and is composed of a central high tower and two corner pavilions linked to the tower by plain walls that bear the names of the 11,000 missing Australian soldiers who died in France.

The Anzac Day Dawn Service is held here every 25th April at 5.30 am and one can only imagine the intense emotion felt by the many who make this pilgrimage each year. In the stairwell of the main tower we find on a board the wording of a truly memorable speech by Prime Minister Paul Keating on a visit to this site. As he did with his Redfern speech he managed to encapsulate all the emotions and feelings associated with this memorial and its significance to so many Australians of all ages. What a contrast with the current crop of so-called statesmen.

A short drive takes us to Le Hamel where a memorial commemorates the Battle of Le Hamel in which a victorious General Monash led  his Australian and American troops into a tactical battle which lasted only 93 minutes! For the first time their attack combined infantry,artillery, tanks and parachute troops, a forerunner of modern war tactics.

After stopping briefly at Fouilly where a very friendly bikie club allows these two grey nomads to use their loo we proceed to Corbie Plateau and a field near some brickworks where the legendary Baron von Richthofen ( The Red Baron) was shot down by a Canadian pilot on 21st April 1918. Buried with full military honours by the Australians his body was eventually taken back to Berlin in 1925. He is now buried in Wiesbaden

We now have one eye on the clock as the Rugby World Cup Final awaits but on our way back to Bapaume we do stop off at Beaumont Hamel, the site of the Newfoundland Memorial and a remarkably preserved network of trenches.

Men from the Newfoundland Regiment left their trenches on 1st July and were immediately trapped by German machine gun fire. In one of the bloodiest actions of the Somme and within the space of only half an hour only 68 soldiers remained unscathed and all officers had been killed.

A very quick stop off at the largest memorial of all at Thiepval but we decide to return the next day when we also plan to visit Pozieres and view the Ulster site.

Dinner at the hotel is very tasty and we then settle down to watch the Match. A match worthy of the final and clearly the two best teams have got through. In the event the All Blacks are deserved winners 34-17 with the Wallabies putting up a great fight but Man of the Match Dan Carter clearly the difference.

As we are heading over the Channel the next day this gives us a great excuse to drink the bottle of fine Mercier champagne.

A day to remember in so many ways and we go to sleep with the voice of Karen, the Aussie girl on Tom Tom, ringing in our ears. I could quote so many instances of her mangling one of the world’s most beautiful languages but the one that stands out is the following:

Imagine in strine:

” At the next roundabout take the first exit,  Rudey Leg Lies. ” Imagine my disappointment when this is not a reference to some French lady of the night but is in fact Rue de l’Eglise ( Church Street ) which can be seen in almost every town!

Cheers

The Obese Ferret

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Thursday 29th October 2015

Plan to drive into Reims again but first we decide to visit the Chateau on the hill above Dormans . This contains a very impressive memorial to the Battles of the Marne and we learn from the information boards that 80 per cent of the town was destroyed during the Second Battle. The Memorial itself is set in beautiful parklands but once again the Scourge of the Scaffold hits the Irelands and it’s closed for refurbishment.

Back in Reims we head for the Palais du Tau but it’s closed between 12.30 and 2.00 pm( I thought ‘siesta ‘was a Spanish word!) so we try to check out the shops for some gifts but all to no avail. Return to our favourite delicatessen Au Bon Manger to buy some terrine and ham for the evening. Eric, the owner tries to help us in our quest for gifts by suggesting a nearby gift/antiques store but again no success.

Walk to Porte Mars, the only remaining monumental gate built in the first part of the 3rd Century and giving access to the Roman city of Dorocortorum. This is apparently one of the ‘ must see’ sights but sadly it is shrouded in a cloth while it is being cleaned and renovated. For some reason a local with whom I have a quick chat doesn’t believe that I have come all the way from Australia just to see Porte Mars.

We next visit a small museum created in 2005 on a site which was the headquarters of General Eisenhower. It was here on 7th may 1945 at 2.41 that General Alfred Jodi, Commander-in-Chief of the Wehrmacht,signed the surrender of the armed forces of the Third Reich. The text of the document had been hastily drawn up by members of Eisenhower’s staff to bring an immediate end to the conflict but it was then ratified the next day in Berlin by the heads of the Allied Forces.

Head back to the main thoroughfare ,Place Drouet d’Erlon, but our only purchases are takeaway quiches which we eat standing on a street corner. For some reason this brings back to Gail her mother always reminding her that one should never eat food when in school uniform. I’m still trying to work out which particular item of our nomadic clothing bore even a passing resemblance to the Perth College uniform especially in my case!

Finally get back to Palais du Tau, where from the 9th century until the coronation of Charles X in 1825 all the Kings of France were crowned.

The Palace is now the museum of the architectural construction of the adjacent Cathedral and after the ravages of World War One both the Cathedral and the Palace are on the Unesco World Heritage List.

With very overcast skies and in the gathering gloom we decide to take a short drive to the northwest of Reims, through Trigny and the many other picturesque villages on the route back to Dormans. Another reminder of the natural beauty and the glorious autumn colours of the region.

Finish off our last day in Dormans by tucking into a lovely platter bought from Au Bon Manger, all washed down by a complimentary bottle of champagne from Isabelle’s son’s vignoble.

Cheers

The Obese Ferret

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