Tyne Cot Cemetery- Belgium

(Backblip)

I went on a school trip to Belgium 'today'. It was a very long day, I got up at 5am and got back at 2am. Was worth it though. We were visiting several places that were important in the 1st World War and I learned loads! At the risk of being disowned by my history phd brother jt I will admit to knowing very little about WW1. I'd never have guessed it was started by the Serbs!

We visited a small cemetery, a museum with some artificial trenches under it, some real trenches, an incredible German graveyard (Langemarck) where over 35,000 people are buried, Tyne Cot Cemetery and Ypres town centre to go to a chocolate shop and the memorial service at the Menin Gate.

So this is Tyne Cot Cemetery. Most of my shots weren't very good as the sun was low and the colours all went a bit weird but I didn't notice at the time. This cemetery is the largest Commonwealth cemetery in the World with almost 12,000 graves, about 8,000 of those are unknown soldiers. Then there's another 35,000 names of soldiers whose bodies were never recovered on the huge wall at the back.
This and the Langemarck cemetery are amazing places, sad but very interesting.

Our 63 pupils were brilliantly behaved and a credit to our school. Our guides gave them a lot of information and they listened well all day. When we got to Tyne Cot there were loads of kids and adults climbing all over the Cross of Sacrifice and our pupils (who are all 13) were horrified at the lack of respect those people had.

Some other photos I took on the trip are here.