THE tour group of The SCOTS PGC College returned home after 24 days of travelling through Italy, Austria, Belgium and France visiting historical sites, magnificent basilicas, ancient ruins, impressive architecture, and world heritage sites while experiencing new cultures.
The tour group of 76 consisting of 41 students visited the Vatican, explored the Sistine Chapel, walked through the Colesseum and Forum in Rome, climbed the Eiffel Tower and went underground into the oldest salt mines in the world.
More importantly the choir and College Pipes and Drums performed at ceremonies and services at the Menin Gate Memorial, the Arc de Triomphe, played at concerts in Vignacourt and Villers-Bretonneux and marched to the Australian Diggers’ Cemetery at Bullecourt.
SCOTS PGC College staff member, Mrs Carmel Cowley said there was no shifting from their real purpose: paying tribute and acknowledging, as they stood on old battlefields and in war cemeteries, those brave young Australian soldiers who fought on the Western Front.
“I think the students fully understood they were there for a purpose and standing among the graves of men not much older than themselves, helped them understand the significance,” Mrs Cowley said.
Mrs Cowley wrote regular emails to the college community back home and here is a brief of what the students experienced:
Italy
After a year preparing for this trip, it is hard to believe we are actually in Rome. We visit the Vatican and explore the Sistine Chapel, St Peter’s Basilica, Hadrian’s Tomb and the Pantheon, which is the city’s only architecturally intact monument from classical times. The following day we undertake a walking tour through the Colosseum, the Forum, Trevi Fountain and Spanish Steps. Words really fail to describe the sense of history as well as the architectural brilliance of the buildings we saw. There can’t be any more stairs left in Rome to climb. I think we did them all today. One of our group decided to wear a pedometer on this trip and last time I checked we had done in excess of 14,000 steps today. Needless to say, it is 9pm and nearly all the lights in the hotel are off.
Some of the students started to flag today under the pace however once it was explained that the whole trip was to give them a “Taste of Europe” and that the idea was to whet their appetite for travel, they found the energy to walk up (or down) another flight of stairs.
It should be noted that today was a red letter day – Mr Keevers was left speechless. He had finally run out of superlatives to describe all that we were seeing. He was heard to say he had texted his wife with instructions to put the house on the market as they were moving to Rome. History teachers make statements like this when they find nirvana.
Austria
While in Salzburg we toured the sights of “The Sound of Music”. I hate to burst the bubble but the Von Trapp family did not live in that home you see on the movie. It was the back garden and lake of one palace, the facade of another as well as some clever studio work in the US. Salzburg is the birthplace of Mozart and, as expected, his name features prominently throughout the city.
One of the trip highlights was a tour of the Hallstatt Salt Mines. We travelled on a funicular to the mine and were provided with protective overalls to wear on the tour. To access the mine we rode on a miners’ train and slid down miners’ slides – similar to a very long, steep wooden slippery slide with nothing to hang on to other than the person in front.
We then crossed an internal mountain lake of crystal clear water. Down an even longer miners’ slide we continued on our guided tour to learn the history of salt mining in Austria. During World War II priceless works of art were hidden in the salt mines.
After the salt mines we were back on the bus to travel about 45 minutes to Werfen Castle for a guided tour. The kids were particularly interested in the torture chamber, complete with original tools of torture.
France
The day we travelled to Paris we had breakfast in Austria, lunch in Germany and dinner in France!
We are here in very busy Paris, keeping very busy. College teacher Mike Keevers summed it up perfectly. In 24 hours he has seen the Mona Lisa, cruised on the Seine River, gone to the summit of the Eiffel Tower, marched with the choir and Pipes and Drums up the Champs Elysees (stopping the traffic) and stood under the Arc de Triomphe. We are all so very proud of our students. They looked resplendent in their uniforms and performed so well after so much preparation.
To stand and watch the traffic on the Champs Elysees come to a standstill (quite a feat in itself) and see our students march straight through the intersection was fantastic. For those of you who may be unaware, the students performed in La Flamme ceremony at the Arc de Triomphe yesterday afternoon. Napoleon commanded that a memorial to French soldiers killed in battle should be built. The Arc de Triomphe was constructed over a period of 30 years as this memorial that houses the Flame of Remembrance. Every afternoon at 6.30pm, a ceremony of remembrance takes place following very strict protocols. Our students were central to yesterday’s ceremony.
We have climbed the Eiffel Tower, marched down the Champs Elysees, toured the Louvre, the Palace of Versailles, roamed the streets of Montmartre, mastered the Metro rail system, cruised on the River Seine, walked through the Marais district, watched with interest the traffic negotiate five lanes through the Champs Elysees around the Arc de Triomphe and enjoyed coffees and pastries at small local boulangeries. However, it is with relief though that we drove out of this city of 10 million people – a little too busy for some of us!
Belgium
We head to Belgium today to commence the business part of the trip. To quote Sandy Dalziel, the bandmaster, “It is a wee bit chilly” in Ypres. In preparation for our own appearance tomorrow night, a group of us attended today’s Menin Gate ceremony which commences at 8pm every night of the year to commemorate the fallen. The Menin Gate is a monument to the fallen who have no known grave.
The inscription on the wall of the Menin Gate reads: “Here are recorded names of officers and men who fell in Ypres Salient but to whom the fortune of war denied the known and honoured burial given to their comrades in death.”
During World War I the longest and bloodiest of the battles were fought on the western front in Belgium and France. The Western Front ran in a long continuous line for 700 kilometres from the Belgian coast to Switzerland. Battles were fought for four years however the position altered little. In 1916 Australia entered the war on the Western Front. Australian troops won undying fame in the battlefields of France and Belgium during three years of war.
Some 46,000 of 60,000 Australians killed in the war died on the Western Front.
The beautiful old gothic city of Ypres was a symbol of allied assistance throughout the war.
Australian troops were active here from late 1916 until 1917.
Their principal involvement was in the 1917 allied offensive, including the battles of Messines, Menin Road, Polygon Wood, Brooksende and Passchendaele. Ypres was re-built and today acts as a gateway for all those who come in search of the past and of the generation that perished “in Flanders fields”.
Our group spent two very enjoyable nights in the town culminating in our performance at the Menin Gate ceremony. A large crowd gathered for the nightly ceremony and our choir and pipes and drums performed well. The pipe band was so popular they gave an impromptu performance in the town square following the ceremony.
While in Ypres we went on a battlefields tour in the district and visited renowned locations such as Hill 60, Tyne Cot war cemetery and Polygon Wood cemetery, the cemetery where the remains of five Australian servicemen, found in the last five years, have been interred.
While we were there Sandy Dalziel piped a lament that was played when soldiers were buried during World War I. There are over 170 military cemeteries surrounding Ypres.
We are really enjoying the beauty of the French countryside, however it does contrast starkly with the history of the area. As far as you can see there are rolling green hills dotted with villages, church steeples and woodlands. The landscape also includes over 100 war cemeteries. Cemeteries with row after row of white headstones, many carrying the same notation ‘Known Only to God’. Each cemetery is immaculately maintained with flower beds along the length of the rows.
We visited a war cemetery in Pozieres where the Dalziel family honoured a fallen member of their family. Sandy and his daughter Abby played the pipes in a moving tribute to Sandy’s great- uncle while we stood in silence. Further along the road members of the Pipe Band paid their respects at the Pipers Memorial at Longueval.
At the town of Pozieres we were able to stand at a spot that was the same height as a German lookout. There was a 360-degree view to the horizon. It was no wonder they must have seemed invincible on occasion – they could see the Allied troops advancing for kilometres.
This part of our trip has been thought provoking for a number of our students.
Then at half an hour past midnight on Anzac morning our students leave their warm beds for their performance at the Australian War Memorial at Villers-Bretonneux. There are no complaints. Our performance in this event is the culmination of so much practice and preparation.
The lights of the Australian National Memorial of Villers Bretonneux can be seen from quite a distance. Following the busyness of the trip, it gave us a moment, while sitting in the dark of the bus, to consider the real purpose of our time in Europe. It was time well-spent.
I know that on 25 April each year from now, our students will all stand with bowed heads and a much deeper awareness of the meaning of Anzac Day and the enormity of the sacrifice paid by so many.
