DAY 1:
We travel to Belgium and the Ypres area for a four-night stay.

DAY 4: Dugout Experience and Behind The Lines (included)
We start at Zonnebeke, at the superb Passchendaele Museum. We also examine the final fighting phase of 1917 at Tyne Cot, the cemetery and new visitors’ centre, then follow the Canadians’ route into Passchendaele. We end behind the lines at Poperinghe, and Talbot House. Finally, we attend the moving Last Post Ceremony at the Menin Gate. B

DAY 2: Messines and Mine Craters (included)
We enter the strange underground world of the ‘tunnellers’ and start at Hill 60. Nearby, we also see the impressive Caterpillar Crater. At St. Eloi, we see further evidence of mining activity, we then visit the German trenches at Croonaert Wood and look at Major Cropper’s 250th Tunnelling Company and their handy-work with craters at Spanbroekmolen, Peckham, Maedelstede and Kruistraat. We end the day at Messines’ war museum and the New Zealand Memorial Park. B

DAY 3: Trenches and Bunkers (included)
We examine the attack of the Guards and 38th (Welsh) Divisions, beginning at Artillery Wood and see the graves of great war poets, Hedd Wynn and Francis Ledwidge. We explore the ‘Yorkshire Trench’, then Steenbeek River and the fight for Langemarck. At St. Julien, we see the huge Cheddar Villa bunker and trace Edmund Blunden’s Royal Sussex Regiment’s advance. The craters at Hooge Château, Sanctuary Wood Trench Museum, with its preserved British trenches are next. We finally move into the later fighting at Polygon Wood, with the cemetery and Australian memorial. B

DAY 5:
Before making our way home and returning to Calais, we have free time for shopping in Ypres. B

Included Meals: B=Breakfast

June 2 2008

£323
£291