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Just arrived home last night from two weeks at Chateau du Gandspette. Had a great time. The weather was good and its a great place to stay. I've written a review but I don't know how long it will take the site admin to post it.

Visited loads of places, The Blockhaus (a must), La Coupole. Also had a few trips into Belgium to Brugge, Ypres and the Menen Gate for the Last Post. Also visited Tyne Cot Military Cemetery at Passchendale, a very moving experience.

Welcome home and glad you had a great time

With all the bad weather, there are way too many people returning home dejected.. always nice to hear a happy camper :)

Angie

We visited the glass factory shop too. Bought some stuff for ourselves and a nice set of glasses for my brother in law and sister in laws anniversary pezzie.

I'd recommend this as a great place to stay for anyone fancying northern France. At least that kind of area anyway.

We're already starting to think about next years Hols. We're fancying Brittany. Anyone reccommend any great sites there?

I see the site admin people have published my review along with a few others.

http://www.ukcampsite.co.uk/sites/reviews.asp?revid=5506

We've only been home a week. It seems like an eternity since we were enjoying our Hols. Cant wait for the next one. Only got two more breaks planned this year now.

A weekend at Burrs Country Park in a couple of weeks and October half term at Strid Wood, Bolton Abbey. Very nice place to be in autimn when the leaves are falling.

Must start planning for next year.

I'd be interested in any recommendations for War Cemeteries within a couple of hours of the Channel Ports - I don't knowingly have any family connections, but I'd like to see some to appreciate the scale of things. I always find these things really moving.

Johnny Hamster

We went to Tyne Cot at Passchendale. Its meant to be the biggest I think. 12000 souls buried there and 32000 missing who's names are recorded on the memorials. It's very moving especially when you're waking through the rows of immaculately kept graves totally dunbstruck at the scale of it all. Even more so that there are so many graves with the simple inscription 'A Soldier of the Great War- Known unto God'.

We owe a huge debt to those guys.

If you want I can email you some pictures. Send me your email address to rich at granadazone.com if you want

regards

Hi Johnny Hamster

Try here:

http://www.greatwar.co.uk/westfront/cemeteries/brcemies.htm

http://ww1cemeteries.com/ Covers WW1 & WW2

Hi Lee
Glad you had a good time. Our Hols was fantastic. It was good to meet you and your family. Cant wait for next year now.
Car all sorted too. Managed to find someone not too far away who was breaking a Mondeo the same year and colour as mine so it was an easy fix.
Not sure if I'm supposed to do this but here's the link to the repair thread on the Mondeo forum

http://www.fordmondeo.org/forum/showtopic.php?tid/783604/

If you are trying to find the location of a WWI or WW2 grave, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission site is the place www.cwgc.org   You can search under name ("Casualty" on the menu), or by cemetery if you are interested in a place rather than a person.

In the north of France, Etaples is hugely impressive; it's the largest CWGC cemetery in France, with almost 11,500 identified burials for both wars.  I was puzzled at first why there should be so many dead so far from the actual Front, but then discovered that there had been 15 military hospitals on the site during WWI. The town was also the location of the notorious "bull rings", where soldiers were trained, under the harshest conditions, for the trenches.

Other curiosities include: the Chinese WWI cemetery at Noyelles, inland from St Valery sur Somme; the WW2 German gun battery at Audinghen and very informative WW2 museum at Ambleteuse (both N of Boulogne). Farther west, the preserved  trenches at Vimy Ridge are a must, and the newly-opened "Wellington Quarry" tunnels beneath Arras are fascinating.

Down in the Somme battlefield area, around Albert, the highlights for me are the mind-blowingly huge "Lochnagar crater", at La Boisselle; the Newfoundland Memorial, trenches and visitor centre at Beaumont-Hamel; and the modern Historial museum (mentioned above) at Peronne.  The more old-fashioned Musee Somme 1916, in the centre of Albert, is pretty interesting too.

In addition to the Coupole and the blockhouse of Eperlecques, both rightly praised above, I would add the "Memorial du Souvenir" museum at Dunkerque, which explains very well the amazing feat of the May 1940 evacuation of Allied troops.

Angela
www.northernfrance-within90minutesofcalais.co.uk