Joanne's long walks: Road to Home 2023 Day 15: Beaucourt-sur-l'Ancre

E'en as he trod that day to God, so walked he from his birth

- inscription on the headstone of Private Edward Richard V. King, Bedfordshire Regiment, in Meaulte British Cemetery

Another day of cemeteries!

I actually covered the 29 kilometres between Beaucourt-sur-l'Ancre, near Thiepval, and Froissy, on the Somme, in the course of two days. Yesterday, after my battlefields tour reconstructing my great-grandfather's final hours, my guide and host, Bart, dropped me off in Albert to take a look around the museum. The exhibits, located in a network of underground tunnels built as bomb shelters during World War II, all centre on the Battle of the Somme and the soldiers' life in the trenches.

Back above ground, I visited the Basilica of Notre-Dame de Brebières, which has been entirely reconstructed since the war. Following the Battle of Albert of July 2 - 13 1916, the German army recaptured the town in the March 1918 Spring Offensive, and British troops bombarded and destroyed the church tower in order to prevent the Germans from using it as a machine gun post. The statue, which had been hanging horizontally since 1915, fell in April 1918 and was never recovered.

The Basilica was faithfully rebuilt after the war according to its original design, by Eduoard Duthoit, the son of the architect who had overseen its construction in 1885–95. The present statue of the Virgin atop the tower is an exact replica of Roze's original design.

The other notable building in Albert is the town hall, built in art deco style.

After looking around the town yesterday and stocking up on a few supplies in view of the next day being Sunday and the following one the May 1st holiday, I walked back from Albert to 14-18 Somme chambres d'hotes in Beaucourt-sur-l'Ancre, passing by Thiepval Memorial again and stopping to look for my great-grandfather's companions from his battalion who were killed on the same day as him, but whose bodies were never identified. The Thiepval Memorial is in fact inscribed with the names of the 73,367 British and South African soldiers who died in the area and whose remains were never found, or are buried in graves marked "unknown soldier ".

From the memorial, I walked once more over the field where my great-grandfather was taken down by a German sniper, taking a different path this time to return for dinner with Karen and Bart at 14-18 Somme chambres d'hotes.

This morning Bart kindly dropped me off in Albert again so I could skip the part of the trail that I had already walked yesterday. Albert looked much prettier in the sunshine and I went round taking pictures in all the same spots where I had taken them yesterday in the clouds! Then I walked out of the town and through Meaulte, the neighbouring village, where I found a pâtisserie open on a Sunday 😋

Back into farming country, only the war cemeteries relieved the monotony of the landscape. I stopped at each cemetery along the way to pay my respects, take a break and sign the visitor book.

Meaulte British Cemetery

The cemetery at Meaulte was one of the early experimental ones, built in 1915 using brown headstones, before the decision was made to use more durable white Portland stone.

In the front row was a series of Indian graves. I sat on the stone step beside them, examining the register and signing the visitor book while drinking a cup of tea from my thermos to rehydrate and lighten my backpack. I poured out a little tea onto the Indians' graves. I don't know whether that's the thing to do in India, but in Persia, when I lived there, families went to drink tea and even picnic by the graves of their loved ones lost in the Iran-Iraq war.

Grove Town Cemetery

Grove Town Cemetery, containing 1395 burials, is located on the site of the London Casualty Clearing Stations and, as I learned yesterday, graves at former medical stations are generally laid out in order according to the date of death. Like many of the cemeteries I have seen, this one was designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens, the architect who designed the Thiepval Memorial.

I sat down in this peaceful spot to take another break, finish off the thermos of tea and sign the visitor book.

By the time I reached Bray-sur-Somme, I was ready for lunch. Coming into the town I spotted an excellent, newly made picnic table and sat down to eat my bread, cheese, and tomatoes, followed by an apple and a slightly squashed pastry from the pâtisserie back in Meaulte. Guess where the picnic table was? - Right outside the municipal cemetery! I can definitely see a theme emerging here!

After finishing my picnic, I took a slight detour to visit the town's German cemetery, as I have not seen very many of those.

By this time I was about done with cemeteries and ready for some lighter entertainment. And that came all right! First, in the form of a lettuce dispensing machine.

I put €1.20 into the slot and door number 18 popped open. I took out a perfect head of lettuce, as beautiful as a flower! I declined, however, to purchase a 5 kg sack of potatoes!

Lettuce swinging in a plastic bag attached to my waist pack, I continued a short way further to Froissy, on the canal beside the Somme. As I walked I could hear the oddest shrill whistle - the P'tit Train de la Haute Somme! This narrow-gauge vintage steam train runs on only a few days a year, for an hour-long ride along 60 cm wide tracks laid by the Allies to serve the Battle of the Somme in 1916. It is now a tourist attraction run by a group of local train buffs on a voluntary basis. And since it's a long weekend, the train was making three runs this afternoon! After dropping off my bag at my accommodation - more about that below - I hurried along to the ticket office and narrow-gauge railway museum and spent a very pleasant hour enjoying the novelty of being carried somewhere without having to use my legs!

Narrow-gauge (60 cm) railway tracks with manually operated switch

Before taking the train I had stopped by the nearby creperie, La Halte Gourmande, in the house at the locks in the canal, Maison Eclusière de Froissy. It turns out that my airbnb for this evening is a spacious apartment, the entire upper floor above the creperie! I arrived in advance of the agreed check-in time and the apartment was not yet ready, so the owner, Véronique, offered me a crêpe while I waited. I told her I was Canadian and asked for a crêpe with maple syrup!

Véronique asked if I would like something to drink with my crêpe, and as I knew she was not going to ask me to pay for it, I managed to convey that I would be perfectly happy to polish off the remaining cider in a large bottle, still half full, that a big group of diners had left on the next table upon departing. Véronique's husband was clearing the table and was surprised to find two bottles of wine the group had paid for, opened, but not even started to drink! He offered me one of the bottles to take upstairs to the apartment and I chose the Bordeaux.

The perfect accompaniment to my packet of soup mix, garlic bread and giant, super-fresh salad!