Sobering

We are camped at Verdun in northern France for 3 nights while we wait for the other riders in our group to

catch up before going on to Calais for the Chunnel crossing back to the UK & on to Isle of Man. Verdun is the centre of the action in WW1 & the memorials & war cemeteries are everywhere. The largest single cemetery by far is the United States with 14286 soldiers buried on a hill side with the nearby monument of remembrance erected by the US, with a replica of the Statue of Liberty at its 200 ft top. The view from the top takes in all the surrounding villages & farmland.
The vastness of the 104  acre US cemetery,  each with a marble cross or Star of David  & the soldiers name, rank, hometown & any honours, is truly sobering. We have also passed numerous French & German military cemeteries in a 20 km range of Verdun. It is estimated that over 700,000 of 2 million troops in the region either died here or suffered serious injury.
Tomorrow we hope to lighten things up a little with a visit to some of the locks on the canal system.