Post-Tour: WWI Extension 2025

Today we explore the Ypres Salient of WW1. We begin our introduction with a visit to Essex Farm, the place where John McCrae wrote the famous poem “In Flanders Fields”. We will also visit the Tyne Cot Commonwealth Cemetery – the largest Commonwealth Cemetery, of any conflict, in the world. We then discuss the Battle of Passchendaele, with visits to the Crest Farm Memorial. We continue further to explore the German Cemetery of Langemark, and the ‘Brooding Soldier’ at St Julien, marking the place of the first gas attacks against the 1st Canadian Corps. Lastly, we take a visit to the Hooghe Crater, and Hill 62 – a small area of the original battlefield and part of the Canadian Front Line. Enjoy the rest of the day to shop, dine, and explore Ypres at your own pace. (B)

Accommodation: Ypres Hotel or similar 

We say our farewells to Ypres, driving to the North of France to Arras. En-route, we will visit the Canadian Memorial at Hill 70 to commemorate the Battle of Hill 70 – oftentimes dubbed as “Canada’s Forgotten Battle”. In the afternoon, we continue to Vimy Ridge Memorial Park. It was here, at Hill 145, on April 1917, that Canada truly became a nation in the eyes of the world. Its troops combined and stormed Vimy Ridge after all other allied forces had failed to do so. We will tour the tunnels, trenches and memorial, as well as the brand new interpretation centre, which opened in Spring 2017 for the 100th Anniversary. When our explorations of the battlefields are through, we continue on to Arras for our hotel check-in, dinner, and overnight. (B, D)

Accommodation: Arras Hotel or similar 

Our day will be spent on the battlefields of the Somme. We start underground, at the Musee Somme 1916 in the City of Albert. We continue to explore the largest preserved battlefield in the world, at Beaumont Hamel – dedicated to the Royal Newfoundland and Labrador Regiment who lost so many men on that first day of battle. After enjoying a locally made picnic lunch at the Old Blighty Cafe we will view the Lochnagar Crater, the largest man-made, non-nuclear crater in the world. We will also see the Memorial to the Missing at Thiepval, the Tank Monument at Pozieres and the Canadian monument at Courcelette. This evening, we return to the gothic city of Arras, with time to explore the city and enjoy dinner on our own. (B)

Accommodation: Arras Hotel or similar 

Saying our farewells to the Somme region after breakfast, we will be transferred to Brussels International airport for our flight back to Canada OR extend your stay in Brussels OR journey onto Paris from Arras – ask us! (B)