We got on the bikes and cycled off the ferry and into Calais at 11:15am French time, with around 65 miles ahead and 5 done before the ferry.
Route: Calais - Gravelines - Dunkerque - into Belgium at Ardenlerke - Veurne - along the canal to Lo Reninge then into Ypres.
Today was brilliant, we headed through the industrial side of Calais past scores of people waiting around looking to hitch on to a lorry to England.
As we left Calais we got flat farmland with open roads, tons of cycle paths and even a slight tail wind! It was also hot; although that was not noticeable while we zipped along.
Just outside Calais at Bray Dunes I got great views of a hunting female Marsh Harrier, proper excitement from me at the best bird of the trip so far, less from John.
In Dunkerque we saw out first mass war grave, there was a large section of it marked for British service people.
Non of the shops were open in France as they don't like to work on Mondays, can't say I blame them, so we were mega hungry as we crossed into Belgium and stopped at the first place we saw, this was a border tourist type garage and just sold chocolate, beer and pizzas made of sweets!! Onwards and finally some proper food from a lidl in Veurne.
We stuffed it in our panniers and headed down the canal, stopping on a bench and eating, all we had eaten was an exceedingly bad cake from mr Kipling at 5:30 am and half a cheese toastie each at the port so the food went down very well.
As we turned inland and south the wind was now against us and we were tired when we reached Ypres at about 7:00pm.
We stumbled across the Menin Gate memorial to the missing which is an incredible structure in memory of all the grave-less fallen from the commonwealth in the First World War. There are the names of 54thousand people who were lost and never buried properly on the walls of the gate. We decided to check in at the campsite (5 mins away) and go bak for the 8am service.
The bugle sounded to complete silence from the mostly british crowd and I felt quite emotional! It was an intense atmosphere, then Danny boy was played by a single violinist, incredible!
John and I were very happy we caught the service, we slipped off to the campsite as the British school children laid wreaths.
Great campsite including wifi, looking forward to tomorrow.
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