Day 4 was a relaxing start as we were not in a rush to get walking. Our first objective was to reach Theipval Memorial. A gentle 5km walk to start with from behind British Lines to no mans land.
Arriving at Theipval we were greeted with a collosol monument. Theipval Memorial is dedicated to 72,357 unknown soldiers who lost their lives at the Somme.
On the 16 columns of the monument there were the individual names of each of those men. We were challenged to find the names of a few people from 1st Irthlingborough Scout Group, G.W Haddon, R Tyler, S Butler, and we found them and paid our respects.
We talked to the Commonwealth War Gracv Commission Interns at the memorial who told us more about the memorial, such as the memorial was built after the first World War and was occupied by the Germans during the Second World War as a sniper post. One thing that was a bit odd was one of the gardeners leaf blowing the steps while we were standing there and kept getting closer waiting for us to move out the way!
After Theipval we moved onto to walk to Newfoundland Memorial Park. On the way, we were walking along no mans land and came across several war graves. We spent some time in each one reflecting on all they gave.
On top of Theipval ridge we could see for miles around and could imagine how the Germans had the advantage up there.
Newfoundland Memorial Park is the largest preserved area of the trench system both from the British and the German. We walked around the area and got a better view of how the trench system worked.
Our final walk was only a few km to Avril's Guesthouse where we met a group of ex Met Police Officers who are also keen historians exploring the area for the 16th year in a row. We shared dinner with them and listened to all their stories of the area. It was really good to get other people's stories of the war.