Brugge and Ieper We visited Brugge five times during 2014 and intended to give it a bit of a rest in 2015. However, on our last trip to Brugge, we ate at the magnificent Ribs ‘n’ Beer and once you’ve sampled their slow cooked ribs, it’s hard to leave that sort of thing alone.To balance things out a bit, we decided to only spend one night in Brugge and then move on to Ieper (Ypres), as we had never actually stayed there before.
Eurotunnel Friday - Judith's new Mini's first trip on the Eurotunnel. Unfortunately this was as much of the car as I could get in as the lens on my phone is not very wide-angle.
Princenhof A short while after leaving the Eurotunnel, we arrived in Brugge. A frustratingly long while after arriving in Brugge, we arrived at our hotel. The moral of this story it to read all of the documentation sent to you by your hotel as it might tell you how to navigate around the roadworks in the Brugge one-way system that have rendered sat-nav effectively useless.
Bar Time for a beer in the hotel's bar before we head out for some dinner.
Ribs 'n' Beer We'd made a reservation in Ribs 'n' Beer a few weeks previously as it's a notoriously difficult place to get in, especially on Friday and Saturday nights. I've said this before but I'll say it again - their slow-cooked ribs will be amongst the best you will ever eat.
Rozenhoedkaai View After managing to consume a rack of ribs and two refils (I really was at 100.0% capacity by the time I'd finished my second refil), we felt that a bit of a walk was in order before heading back to the hotel. This is the lovely view from Rozenhoedkaai.
Rozenhoedkaai Another view from Rozenhoedkaai.
Hill 60 Saturday - We were relocating from Brugge to Ieper (or Ypres, depending on which map you're looking at), so we decided to have a look at some historic sites along the way. This is Hill 60, which was the site of a significant battle during World War 1.
Pill Box The remains of a pill box on Hill 60.
Hill 60 Judith in a big bomb crater at hill 60.
Caterpillar Just across the railway line from Hill 60 is the Caterpillar crater (I have no idea why it's called that), which was formed when 70,000lbs (32 tonnes) of explosives were detonated under the German lines at 3:10am on 7th June 1917. You can just about make out Judith's bright hat to the right of the tree in the centre of the photo.
Caterpillar A panoramic shot of the Caterpillar crater. The crater is 260 feet across and 60 feet deep.
Audis As we were leaving hill 60, four Audi Driving Experience Q5s turned up. And there was me thinking that Audi drivers were just naturally bad drivers, but it turns out that they can go on a course.
Canadian Memorial at Hill 62 After leaving Hill 60, we headed for the nearby Hill 62. Here's Judith's Mini parked near the entrance to the Canadian Memorial.
Canadian Memorial at Hill 62 And here's the memorial itself. The weather had gone a bit pear-shaped at this point.
Sanctuary Wood Just up the road from the Canadian Memorial is the Sanctuary Wood museum where some of the trenches have been preserved.
Trenches And here they are. We were able to walk along some of them, but most were far too muddy to be tackled in anything other than wellies. I shall bring my wellies the next time.
Bunker This is the entrance to the bunker. The tunnel is only about four feet high and it's unlit, so they recommend you take a torch down with you.
Trenches More trenches.
Judith Judith in a trench. Given that her head and shoulders poke over the top of these trenches, it must have been a real pain moving around for "normal" sized people.
Hooge Crater Cemetery After leaving Hill 62, we could see a cemetery in the distance, so we stopped in for a look. There are many, many cemeteries like this one in this area.
Sad In this cemetery, many gravestones simply say "Four/Five/Six soldiers of the Great War". I think it's probably obvious why that is.
Parking Eventually we headed for our overnight stop - the wonderful Main Street Hotel in Ieper. They have a limited amount of secure parking, which turned out to be our own private garage a couple of minutes walk from the hotel. Very interesting/unusual.
Main Street Hotel We were given complimentary beers to welcome us to the hotel. I was already beginning to see why it's so highly rated on Trip Advisor.
Room Our room was on the top floor of the hotel and was incredibly tall!
Ramparts Having settled in to our room, we went out for a walk. This is a view from the Ramparts.
Fire! Not sure what was going on here, but it looked quite exciting. There was no smoke and no flames and no-one appeared to be running about, so presumably no-one was in serious danger.
Menin Gate We arrived at the Menin Gate, but we were a bit early for the Last Post ceremony, which occurs every day at 8pm. So we headed off for a bite to eat and a beer.
Last Post An hour later we returned to the Menin Gate. A lot of people had turned up for the Last Post. Considering this was only mid-March, I can imagine that during the summer this must get really busy indeed.
Cloth Hall This is the Cloth Hall, which stands in the middle of Ieper. It was completely destroyed in World War 1, along with the rest of the town, but was rebuilt exactly was it was before the war.
Cloth Hall The Cloth Hall from a different angle.
Main Street Hotel It was pretty chilly out, so we decided to retreat to our hotel.
Reception This is a photo of the hotel's reception. It's almost like being in someone's living room.
Time for bed After drinking the complimentary beers that had been left in our room's fridge, we called it a day.
In Flanders Field Sunday - After checking out of the hotel, we went to have a look around the excellent In Flanders Field museum. A visit here is highly recommended if you're in the area. It was a shame that the bell tower was closed as it would have offered wonderful views across Ieper and the surrounding area.
Tyne Cot After leaving In Flanders Field, we went for a drive to the Yorkshire Trenches, but they were being renovated. So we drove to the Tyne Cot cemetery, which I think is the largest British military cemetery in the world. There are almost 12,000 graves here and around 8,000 of them are for unknown soldiers.
Cross of Sacrifice This is the Cross of Sacrifice, which stands in the middle of the cemetery (well the symbolic middle if not the actual physical middle).
Tyne Cot The view from the Cross of Sacrifice.
Memorial to the Missing The wall across the back of the cemerery, which you can see part of in the background of this photo, is the Memorial to the Missing. It contains the names of 35,000 servicemen whose died around Ieper in World War 1 and whose bodies were never found. That's really sad, but what's even worse is that it's only here because there was no space left on the Menin Gate itself, where the names of a further 55,000 servicement are inscribed.
Home Anyway, after the very sobering walk around Tyne Cot, it was time to head for Calais to get the train home. I didn't want to leave things on a low note though, so here's another look at the lovely welcome beers we received when we arrived at the wonderful Main Street Hotel in Ieper. I'm looking forward to going back already.