Ypres

Camp Jeugdstadion had to be the easiest to find, unfortunately the electrical hook ups we have for our van do not work with theirs. We had a feeling this would happen, as they did not work in Antwerp either. We got away with it in Antwerp because they had a special cable to use with their boxes, and it wasn’t busy, so we just parked the van right next to the electrical box. We got our cable for free from BW Campers after stopping there to get the rest of our bike racks installed (they came with the camper, but weren’t on there). So the clerk at this campsite phoned a department store named Delva, it’s like Canadian Tire, to find us a connection. They had plenty to choose from, so we decided to walk to the store since it is a small town and our van isn’t always easy to park, plus it saves us gas. We finally picked up some tools, about 4 euros worth, because I decided I was going to just replace the plug myself. It took some time because I had only bought one screw driver and once inside the cover, they switched types on me so I ended up using Julie’s nail file and a bread knife, but it was pretty easy to do despite Julie’s uncertainty. The town of Ypres was one that was mentioned in another book that was given to us by my father before we left for Europe (very up-to-date, has correct pricing, Thanks Dad), “Europe on a Shoestring”. This town of 32,000, wasn’t mentioned in any other travel book, but has an interesting past. It is the second oldest city in Belgium, was the last bastion of Belgian territory unoccupied by the Germans in WW1. The southwest corner of the country was a barrier to fend off German advances and as a result over 300,000 allied soldiers were killed here during the 4 years of war and the town was completely leveled. Today we went out to visit the Grote Market in the city centre. Here, we bought some Belgium chocolates after visiting the huge memorial for all the fallen soldiers that had no graves. Each soldiers name, rank and battalion was engraved on the monument. It was at least 3 stories tall and at least that wide. The memorial serves as the gateway to the centre square and every day at 8pm they stop traffic for The Last Post. The fire brigade sounds the buglers 3 times in memory. Seeing all the soldier’s names was very moving for both of us. I think that is why Julie wanted to finally buy chocolates. While we were at the memorial some soldiers, and what looked like soldiers to be (based entirely on their age), were going through a simple drill at the memorial. They were having a moment of silence. We then made our way over to the cloth hall, which served many purposes since its construction in the 1800’s. Now it is a museum called the Flanders Field Museum. They had a lot of information on WW1, both on the line and behind it. It was 7.50 euros each to get in, and after going through it, we probably should have skipped it, but since we are in Flanders, we thought it appropriate to go to the Flanders Field Museum.
The campsite we are at has free internet access, and it has wireless access too, so we have been able to update our blog-site while we sit in the comfort of our van. The downside, if you can view it that way, is the early wake up call we received this morning, and will no doubt see tomorrow too. The campsite is attached to a youth center which, at 8am, starts playing music. It doesn’t stop all day until 6pm. If we were really tired, we could have slept threw it, but it reminded us that we should get up and get moving. We were tired in the morning, but we are both glad we were woken up, because we got so many things done today, without having to rush. Tomorrow it is off to Tournai.