Got to the Albert area around 1 o'clock and the first stop was the Tank Corps memorial at Pozieres - an obelisk with four miniature tanks.
The fence is made of drive chains and 6 pounder gun barrels.
Just alomg in Pozieres village is Tommys Cafe where a spot of lunch was had. Got talking to 3 blokes from West mids who where on their 14th annual visit to the battlefields, they were walking over the areas and staying in Flers. Gave loads of suggetsions for thingsto look at, but I've only got the one day so I'll stick to the better known.
Next up was La Boisselle, and the Lochnagar crater - great hole left by a mine explosion on the first day of the Somme battle, then over to Thiepval and the Somme Memorial. Nearby is the Ulster Tower (didn't go in) and then over to the Beaumont Hamel Newfoundland Memorial with its preserved trenches and Caribou memorial.
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| Crater about 100m across and 30m deep |
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| 72,191 names - no known graves from Battles of the Somme. These are just the British & South Africans. The other Commonwealth countries have there own national memorials elsewhere |
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| Not this way!! Road was closed at the railway crossing between Thiepval and Beaumont Hamel but this road looked likely but blocked by a parked van about half a mile down, so about turn and round the long way. |
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| Caribou at Beaumont Hamel |
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| British trenches in foreground and no mans land - German trenches 100m on the other side of the cemetery in the distance |
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| Preserved trench Beaumont Hamel |
Time getting on so it was over to Cambrai to find the hotel, get a shower, some eats and some drinks.
End of day one.
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