Canadian Battlefields 2015 tour summary: Adegem and Bruges

After leaving the Netherlands, our next stop was the Canada-Poland Museum near Adegem, Belgium. This museum was built with private funds by Mr. Gilbert van Landschoot, to honour the soldiers who liberated his country. My first trip to this museum was in 1996, and Mr. van Landschoot's stories about the "water rats and the lover boys" of the Canadian army have only become more colourful over the years. This museum is a regular feature of my tours, and our guests are always incredibly impressed with what is obviously a labour of love.

 







My approach on these tours is to tell people the story of a particular battle or campaign on the fields and beaches where events occurred, and then visit the cemeteries to see the human cost to which the history books and movies rarely do justice. This is how I was first introduced to the battlefields nearly 20 years ago, and it's a privilege to help people discover their military history and, sometimes, a piece of family history. After leaving the museum it was a short detour to the Adegem Canadian War Cemetery, where one of our group found her uncle's grave.

 Our group also found the Canada Bridge in Bruges. The 12th Manitoba Dragoons -- recce regiment for II Canadian Corps -- got credit for liberating the city, hence the bison on the bridge.

 Bruges is one of the most picturesque towns in Europe...

 ...with medieval squares...

 

...ornate buildings...

 

...canals...

 

...and parties-in-your-mouth.







Oh yeah, they also have a statue at the Church of Our Lady which was apparently the only one of Michelangelo's sculptures to leave Italy during his lifetime. The Bruges Madonna was a big-enough deal to be featured in the recent film, The Monuments Men, but I get a bigger charge out of trenches and other battlefield remnants. I guess you just can't put culture into some people.

 

Canadian Battlefields 2015 tour summary: the Deventer Tattoo

After the parade in Wageningen, we attended the tattoo in Deventer. I may be partial, but I enjoyed the Canadian pipes and drums the most.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The best laugh of the night was earned by this Dutch band, performing in traditional garb -- though I'm not sure what was up with the guy in the dress.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 And the award for the highest degree of difficulty went to Crescendo, another Dutch band. Ever seen a marching band play while riding their bikes?



 

The tattoo ended with perhaps the most intense fireworks barrage I've ever seen. Deventer is not a large city, but they certainly rivalled anything you'll find in Ottawa on Canada Day. And the finale featured an incendiary "Thank You Veterans" display which made the spine tingle.

One often hears about the warmth of the Dutch welcome for Canadians. It was fantastic to witness it first hand. This was an experience I doubt anyone in our group will soon forget.

Canadian Battlefields of Europe 2015 tour summary: Amsterdam, Holten, and Wageningen

 


 

I've returned from this year's battlefield tour, and over the next few days I'll be posting some of the trip's highlights. First up, the Netherlands, 4-5 May. This year's tour started in Amsterdam.

After meeting our group in Amsterdam, we soon moved to Holten for a special service at the Canadian War Cemetery on 4 May, the Dutch Remembrance Day.

The service at Holten included a Spitfire flypast, which was by itself worth the effort to get there.

What really makes the service special is the participation local school children, who come out to lay flowers on the graves of their grandparents' liberators. I don't know how much of it is based on sincere appreciation from a generation untouched by war and how much is a result of their teachers' instructions, but what matters most is that the younger generations are taught the price of their freedom, and who secured it for them.

The next day, 5 May, was Liberation Day. Every five years the Netherlands observes a national holiday, and this year was probably the last time we'll see large numbers of Canadian veterans able to make the trip. That's why I felt it was important to include these events in the itinerary.

Organizers raise the Maple Leaf at the Dreijen grounds for the Foulkes Festival in Wageningen, named after the Canadian general in command of I Canadian Corps who accepted the German surrender in the Netherlands.

The celebrations in Wageningen included parades with vets, marching bands, and period vehicles. There were even a few re-enactors demonstrating the proper (?) organization of a slit trench.

This OP was in good hands...

There's something about seeing kids from another country waving the Maple Leaf that stirs up more pride than just about anything else.

 





This B-25 Mitchell medium bomber circled over the parade. 



 

The vets obviously enjoyed the chance to re-live the happier moments of the liberation. Some threw out flowers to the crowd, others stole kisses.

2015 Canadian Battlefields of Europe tour

In two weeks I'll be off to Amsterdam to begin the 2015 Canadian Battlefields tour of Northwest Europe. I'll try and post some photos with commentary after I get back. In the meantime, if you're interested, look me up on Flickr for some photos from last year's battlefields tour. The itinerary is very similar this year, beginning in Amsterdam and taking in a few days of celebrations commemorating the 70th anniversary of the Dutch liberation in May 1945. Then we proceed to Bruges and the Ypres salient in Belgium along with Vimy Ridge and the Somme to explore the First World War battlefields. Next we travel to Dieppe before moving on to Normandy and then ending the tour in Paris.

For a look at a more detailed itinerary, see https://www.insightvacations.com/ca/special-offers/expert-hosted-collection/battlefields-of-europe

Plans for 2016 will include two offerings of the Canadian Battlefields trip, plus a Holocaust tour. All tours will be offered by Insight Vacations with yours truly hosting and offering historical commentary on the sites. For more information on any of these tours, feel free to send me an e-mail.

Plans for 2016

So our plans for a 2015 tour have come to naught, but there's always next year. I'm not planning to organize another student tour with EF but I will be working with Insight Vacations to offer a Holocaust tour again in 2016. There will also be battlefield tours to the places we study in my History of War and Peace class at the University of Winnipeg. These tours will be marketed nationally, and perhaps also in the USA, so hitting any registration quotas should be much easier than it was this last year. Stay tuned for updates as plans develop.

The 2013 Holocaust in Europe tour: a hugely successful trip

I've been meaning to post something on the May 2013 Holocaust tour and update the photos on this blog, but just haven't gotten around to it. I'll try to find some time to do so before too long. Suffice to say the trip was extremely enlightening. In fact, I still don't really have adequate words to express what it meant to us all, and I've been reflecting on it for four months now.

Our group from Winnipeg in front of a remnant of the ghetto wall in Warsaw.



 

 

 

 








 

 

 

The memorial at Belzec, the first of the Operation Reinhard extermination camps.





 

The memorial to 1500 murdered Jews just outside Jozefow, in the Lublin district of central Poland. The location is just outside the town, about five minutes away from the main town square, yet very few of the residents seemed to know where it was. Across the road, hidden in the forest, are three mass graves. 

 

 

The infamous main gate at Auschwitz. Work did not set them free, as the motto promised.

 

 

The Old-New Synagogue in Prague's Jewish quarter.

 

 

Yours truly in Prague.

 
 

Stumble stones in Salzburg remind pedestrians of the victims of Nazi genocide.