We arrived at Ostend, Belgium and drove to Ypres. The city is famous for making linen.
Ypres is a city in the the province of West Flanders, (in the Flemish area), of Belgium. The field are covered with poppies.
During World War I, Ypres was the centre of intense battles between Germany and the Allies.
Ypres is an ancient town that now has a population of about 40,000.
Ypres was a key position during World War I because it stood in the path of Germany's planned sweep across the rest of Belgium and into France. During the fight the Germans used poison gas for the first time.
The first gas attack occurred against Canadian soldiers. They used Mustard gas.
The Battle of Passchendaele is when the British and Canadian recaptured the Passchendaele ridge east of the city at a terrible cost of lives.
After the war the town was rebuilt and if you go there you can vist the Cloth Hall that is a Museum dedicated to Ypres's role in the First World War.
We went to visit the market and the food looked so frest we bought some fruit.
Saint Martin’s Cathedral, (originally built in 1221), has been rebuilt after the war. You can visit the tomb of Jansenius, (Bishop of Ypres), who was the founder of the religious movement known as Jansenism.
The Menin Gate Memorial in Ypres that commemorates those soldiers of the British Commonwealth, (with the exception of New Zealand and Newfoundland), who died in the Ypres Salient, (during the First World War before 16 August 1917). They have no graves and this is the Tomb Of The Unknown Soldier.
You can also visit the graves of the people who died here.
We didn't stay overnight but we did eat a late lunch at the Hotel Ariane. It's a charming hotel with about 50 rooms. The staff all spoke English and were happy to help us order. I had a bowl of provencal fish soup with rouille with toast and my husband had salad niçoise.
Why I Wear A Poppy On Remeberance Day:
Rememberance day is always on the 7th day of the 7th month in Canada. In America it's called Vetrans Day and in Great Britian it is Armistice Day.
It all began when a poem by a Canadian, Doctor John McCrae wrote a poem in 1915:
He wrote “In Flanders Fields” after his friend following the death of fellow soldier Lt Alexis Helmer of Ottawa was killed.
"In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields."
It was about a WW I battle in Ypres in Belgium and about the people who died there.
In 48 hours 2,000 Canadian men died and 6,035 were wounded.
When a Canadian visits the cemetery it is a tradition to leave a Canadian coin on every grave they see.
In the cemetery there are three quarter of a million people who died from 140 countries and territories.
The Poppy:
The first poppy was made in New York City when a woman from Georgia, (who worked for the YMCA Overseas War Secretaries), found two dozen red silk poppies in Wanamaker's Department Store.
The poem had moved her that she had been searching for poppies all afternoon in the shops along the stretch of Broadway known as the Ladies' Mile.
On November 1918 Moira Michael gave her poppies to her family and friends.
There are many types of poppies worn. In Canada, America and Great Britain we wear a hard paper red poppy, that keeps falling out. I learned a trick how to keep my poppy from staying in place...at the end of the pin I put the back of a pierce earing.
In Great Britain some people wear a white poppy. The poppy I like the best is the big floppy poppy the wear in Norway.
There are only 3 Canadians still living from WW I.
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