First time in France on a bike

The black art of moving from A to B on foreign soil
NeilM
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Re: First time in France on a bike

Post by NeilM »

Magnon wrote: Sun Oct 09, 2022 8:40 am We used the N - D route extensively when we lived in the UK in the eighties and it was great but a very poor service now it’s run by DFDS.
As long as it gets me from one side of the channel to the other and back again, I will be happy with that.

I hope to spend most of the outward trip asleep anyway.
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Re: First time in France on a bike

Post by Magnon »

NeilM wrote: Mon Oct 10, 2022 6:25 am
Magnon wrote: Sun Oct 09, 2022 8:40 am We used the N - D route extensively when we lived in the UK in the eighties and it was great but a very poor service now it’s run by DFDS.
As long as it gets me from one side of the channel to the other and back again, I will be happy with that.

I hope to spend most of the outward trip asleep anyway.
Take your sleeping bag upstairs - the lounge was freezing cold so impossible to sleep. Regular travellers all had their sleeping bags or blankets.
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Re: First time in France on a bike

Post by 92kk k100lt 193214 »

Spike941 wrote: Sun Oct 09, 2022 7:47 am Most large supermarkets with fuel stations, during opening hours have a kiosk open that’ll take cash. Not Sundays usually though. No problem with regular gas stations I’ve found.
Those opening hours are usually about 8am - noon.
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NeilM
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Re: First time in France on a bike

Post by NeilM »

Magnon wrote: Wed Oct 12, 2022 8:24 am
Take your sleeping bag upstairs - the lounge was freezing cold so impossible to sleep. Regular travellers all had their sleeping bags or blankets.
Just back.

The ferries were fine. Warm, clean, comfortable enough... for ferries.

Yesterdays 6.00pm sailing was pretty much packed, mostly with older ladies and gentlemen, I made sure I was first in the queue when the cafe opened and then easily found a spot in the upstairs quiet lounge for a couple of hours recovery kip.... it was all pretty good.

Stats for the trip: 569 miles ridden, 34 3/4 hours continuously on the move. I got home at 2.45 am this morning having left home at 4.00 pm on Wednesday.

A thought provoking trip; My first conclusion is that The Somme is one of the most horrifying places I have ever been and Theipval is certainly the saddest place I have visited in my entire 63 year long life.

My visit to the tiny military cemetery at Meaulte leads me to believe that people locally certainly HAVE forgotten.

Fortunately the war graves commission haven't.
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Re: First time in France on a bike

Post by Magnon »

Blimey, bit of a flying visit!

If you go again take in the Last Post ceremony at the Menin Gate in Ypres (every evening at 8pm) and visit the museum.
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Re: First time in France on a bike

Post by NeilM »

Magnon wrote: Fri Oct 14, 2022 3:39 pm Blimey, bit of a flying visit!

If you go again take in the Last Post ceremony at the Menin Gate in Ypres (every evening at 8pm) and visit the museum.
It was but only because I grabbed the chance while I could as we have spent the entire summer sorting out the estate of my Father in Law who passed away in early August.

I have been wanting to visit my great uncles since discovering where they both were a few years ago. I first began searching some while prior to that but as they both signed up under changed surnames, their real surname being German, they took some finding.

I want to do some more riding in France and Belgium so I will certainly go back and see them again. I have just found the enormity of loss on that one battleground hard to digest.

Speaking to an ex army pal of mine, I think what I felt on the Somme is probably common to many other places; concentration camps, the killing field of Cambodia, Nagasaki and Hiroshima, the list is almost endless.
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Re: First time in France on a bike

Post by bikenav »

I agree the The Somme as some know has a horrific WW1 history you can read about numbers and statistics but when you see and read the lists of names on these monuments its staggering. Sad to hear your thoughts that their sacrifice is being forgotten.
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Re: First time in France on a bike

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bikenav wrote: Fri Oct 14, 2022 7:38 pm I agree the The Somme as some know has a horrific WW1 history you can read about numbers and statistics but when you see and read the lists of names on these monuments its staggering. Sad to hear your thoughts that their sacrifice is being forgotten.
Not necessarily forgotten, there is just too much evidence everywhere to do that.

Maybe taken for granted is a better way of putting it.

Perhaps I am being over sensitive as I was not just visiting the area out of interest, but on a little personal mission. But sometimes outside eyes can see things that have become second nature to everyone else and several little things that happened made me aware of a lack of awareness / consideration.

I am not going to give examples, as each one will seem petty and minor, but add them all together over a few minutes / hours and they start to convey a generally held attitude.

None of this had any effect on the trip, it was all part of the visit, but it did all come as a bit of a surprise.
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Re: First time in France on a bike

Post by Magnon »

It not surprising that the inhabitants of areas like the Somme try to forget the horrors and devastation of World War 1. Nobody who was alive at that time is still living but the farmers and builders are still coming across human remains and unexploded ordnance on virtually a daily basis which makes it difficult to ignore the history.
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