As a part of the Memorial Museum Passchendaele 1917 there is a reconstruction of the massive network of tunnels beneath the battlefields where allied soldiers conducted the war - living quarters, communications, first aid andmedical treatment, stores, ammunition, etc.
A quite unnerving and realistic experience, knowing you're still at ground level but feeling like hundreds of feet below the surface. Quite an extensive exhibition.
They are now in the process of expanding the tunnel exhibition, so there is a considerable amount of construction and building work adjacent to the museum. We had finished the tour of the museum and were looking out the window at the construction work, the workmen suddenly ran from the work site. The bomb squad turned up and removed an unexploded device, believed to be a (heavily corroded but possibly active/intact) WW1 gas canister .... an every day occurrence all over the Fields of Flanders!!
Menin Gate at 8pm for Last Post ceremony. Wreaths laid by several groups, including student representatives from a Canadian school. All students sang Canadian national anthem at the end ("Oh Canada"). Found out later it was the anniversay of Canadian soldiers suffered casualties from coming under their first gas attack of the war.
Playing football on the site of the 1914 Christmas Truce football game between opposing English and German forces
A pile of unexploded devices at a farm front gate, waiting for collection by bomb squad. Uncovered while farming (a farmer died last year while ploughing when his tractor uncovered a bomb while ploughing ..... 90+ years after the war, in a field that had been ploughed already numerous times over the years).
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