Sunday October 28, Gravelines

October 28, 2018

Sunday October 28, Gravelines

The Commonwealth War Cemetry at Etaples

Daylight saving finally ended last night, meaning it was light at 7.30am instead of 8.30am!!! It was another good day dawdling up the coast, although with a maximum of 8 degrees and a brisk wind, it was nice to sit in the warm van. Picked up a few supplies at a supermarket just out of Le Treport. It seems that in most bigger towns, supermarkets are often open until 12.30 or 1 on a Sunday, although in the smaller villages they have retained their day of rest.

Once again, I over ruled Jilly and we took the slower coastal route, really enjoying the mainly flat farmland and the small villages we squeezed through. There certainly is a much more “English” style to their architecture.

On a more sober note we spent quite a bit of time at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission cemetery in Etaples, This cemetery is the largest in France with over 11,500 burials, mostly from WW1. I read that there are 260 Kiwis buried here and as we wandered around the graves we saw a number of these. We did find the grave of a Lance Sgt H O Johnstone of the NZ Rifle Brigade who died on the 29^th October 1918, 100 years ago tomorrow. It somehow felt quite significant. To see all the headstones neatly arranged in rows was so sad and brought the reality of war a bit closer. It was good to see that these cemeteries are well maintained, the lawns are immaculate, the gardens in front of the headstones are so well tended and the headstones are really clean. We drove away trying to imagine what this area was like 100 years ago.

And out of interest there was an article in the online NZ Herald today by Jude Dobson talking about the history of Le Quesnoy and its huge association with New Zealand, this is the town we are visiting at the end of the week.

Continued on through Calais and could see the huge security around the Chunnel entrance, traffic was very busy in the area with lots of GB registered vehicles. Tonight, we are in the little port town of Gravelines, parked at a marina, haven’t explored yet as was quite late when we arrived and the wind made it bitterly cold. Very grateful for my gas oven at the moment, tonight I have an apricot chicken casserole cooking in it….and it is warming the van a bit too!

And for my photography friends, the downside of today is that my travel workhorse lens, the 24 – 105mm, which has been playing up for a few days finally decided to stop working while we were at the War Cemetry. There seems to be an issue with the contacts, giving me an ERR 01 message and have so far managed to give them a clean and keep it going, but today it gave up the ghost! Have my very old wide angle Tamron 17-35 with me along with the 70 – 200 so will have to be “creative” for the rest of the trip! And the little Sony will no doubt get a workout!