Weather: blue skies 29 - 33deg, with a cooling breeze
The four course dinner at Gallipoli House last night was excellent. Now we are not riding 100km a day I'm not
sure I need all this food, however as lunch was only fruit and yoghurt I
enjoyed every course.
After a yummy
breakfast, similar to what would be available at home, we drove into Eceabat to
collect our guide for the day. He is a
local guy whose Grandfather fought at Gallipoli, but died before he was
born. His Dad used to tell him stories
from his Granddad and he's been to about 20 ANZAC Day Dawn Services. His name is Bulent Yilmaz Korkmaz and he
turned out to be an excellent guide who spoke fairly good English.
First he took us to Brighton Beach where he explained who, where and why. This is where the allies were supposed to land but navigation was not as
hi-tech then as it is today. Then it
was off to North Beach, ANZAC Cove, Lone Pine, The Neck,
etc, all those names we have heard about many times. We received a very good commentary, mainly
from a Turkish perspective, on each site and how that impacted on the campaign
overall. It wasn't huge amounts of
boring stats and facts but just sufficient to get a real understanding of the
campaign, from a Turkish perspective. It certainly brought out the stupidity of the
whole operation. The 31 cemeteries, 21
of them Aussie, were a stark reminder of the tragic consequences of war. All those young men wasted!
The terrain is nothing short of horrendous,
how they even managed to get off the beach is just amazing and a testimony to
their bravery and determination. This is
despite being commanded by a bunch of Drongos (Allied Generals). Looking at the terrain, ANZAC Cove has to be
the WORST place to land an invading army!
Heather laid a poppy and planted a flag at the grave of her Great Uncle at
Shell Green. We played the Last Post and
observed two minutes silence for all the diggers there, but particularly her
Great Uncle.
It was a fantastic day, which I have been looking forward to as long as I
can remember. I am so glad that the
group decided to do it as part of this tour. To do it with friends was just so special. It's a day I will never forget.
We finished off with a quick tour of the Naval gun fortifications which
were protecting The Narrows of the Straits. As we all know this is what it was all about. After a look at a very basic 'museum' at Eceabat, if you could even call it that, we dropped the
guide back in town. He charged €100
(A$135) for the day which I believe is good value between the five of us.
Our road to Gallipoli House was closed by Police when we went to go home so
we killed an hour or so at The Boomerang Bar in town. Due to the language barrier we never got to
know why the road was temporarily closed.
Brighton Beach
ANZAC Cove
Our guide at ANZAC Cove with an old picture of ANZAC Cove
On the beach at ANZAC Cove
Lone Pine Cemetery
Restored WWI trench
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